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L  1  B  R  J^  R  Y 


Theological     Seminary 

PRINCETON,     N.    J. 


MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY; 


BEING   THE 


KING'S  COLLEGE  LECTUEES 

FOE  1877. 


EDITED,    WITH   A   HISTORICAL    PREFACE, 


By  ALFEED  BAEEY,  D.D., 

PRINCIPAL. 


NEW   YORK: 
E.  P.  BUTTON  &  CO.,   713,   BROABWAY. 

1877. 


CONTENTS. 


Page 
HISTORICAL  PREFACE         v 

RICHARD  HOOKER         1 

By  Alfred  Bakky,  D.D.,  Principal  of  King's  College, 
Loudon,  Canon  of  Worcester  and  Honorary  Chaplain 
to  the  Queen. 

LANCELOT  ANDREWES       61 

By  Richard  W.  Church,  D.C.L.,  Dean  of  St.  Paul's. 

WILLIAM  CHILLING  WORTH      113 

By  E.  H.  Plumptre,  D.D.,  Prebendary  of  St.  Paul's, 
Vicar  of  Bickley,  and  Professor  of  the  Exegesis  of  the 
New  Testament  in  King's  College,  London. 

BENJAMIN  WHICHCOTE      147 

By  Brooke  F.  Westcott,  D.D.,  Regius  Professor  of 
Divinity  in  the  University  of  Cambridge,  Canon  of 
Peterborough,  Rector  of  Somersham,  and  Honorary 
Chaplain  to  the  Queen. 

JEREMY  TAYLOR 175 

By  F.  W.  Farrar,  D.D.,  F.R.S.,  Canon  of  Westminster, 
Rector  of  St.  Margnret's,  and  Chaplain  in  Ordinary  to 
the  Queen. 

JOHN  PEARSON      213 

By  S.  Cheetham,  M.A.,  Chaplain  of  Dulwich  College, 
and  Professor  of  Pastoral  Theology  in  King's  CoUege, 
London. 


a  2 


HISTORICAL  PREFACE. 


The  "  Masters  in  Theology,"  who  are  the  subjects  of 
the  Lectures  in  this  volume,  belong  to  that  period 
(1558-1662)  from  the  accession  of  Elizabeth  to  the 
Bestoration  of  Charles  II.,  which  may  be  said  to  have 
gradually  established  the  position — in  some  sense 
unique  in  Christendom — of  the  Church  of  England. 
They  were  originally  selected,  not  simply  for  their 
intrinsic  greatness,  but  as  being  fairly  represen- 
tative of  different  schools  of  thought.  Each  has 
been  treated  by  a  different  hand ;  and,  at  the  cost 
of  some  occasional  repetition,  and  some  slight  varia- 
tions of  opinion,  I  have  thought  it  better  to  present 
the  Lectures  exactly  as  they  came  from  the  pens  of 
the  various  authors,  hardly  venturing  to  exercise 
any  editorial  prerogative. 

For  this  reason,  however,  it  seems  especially 
necessary  to  prefix  to  the  Lectures  a  short  his- 
torical preface,  to  indicate  (so  far  as  may  be)  the 
succession  of  the  various  phases  of  Theology,  whicli 
these  great  writers  were  designed  to  represent,  in 


VI  HISTORICAL   PREFACE. 

close  connection  ^Yitll  the  varying  fortunes  of  the 
Church  itself. 

(I.)  The  settlement  made  in  the  early  years  of 
Elizabeth  may  be  rightly  considered  as  the  close 
of  the  first  section  of  the  Eeformation  period.  It 
defined,  so  far  as  definition  was  thought  necessary, 
the  position  of  the  Church,  in  relation  both  to  the 
Eoman  Communion,  and  to  the  various  religious 
bodies  which  had  broken  off  from  that  Communion. 

In  the  first  place,  the  renewal  of  the  Act  of  Supre- 
macy— with  the  significant  change  of  the  title 
"  Head  of  the  Church,"  hitherto  given  to  the  Crown 
(under  a  reservation  not  always  recognised),  to  the 
title  of  "Supreme  Governor" — noted  its  resolute 
protest  against  the  two  chief  characteristics  of  the 
]Media3val  system,  viz.  the  absolute  supremacy  of 
the  clergy  in  the  Church,  and  the  universal  alle- 
giance of  all  Christian  churches  to  the  Pope.  For 
in  the  Church  of  England  itself  it  announced  the 
supremacy  over  all,  clergy  and  laity  alike,  of  Law, 
passed  by  the  Convocation  and  Parliament,  and 
enforced  by  the  Crown ;  and  towards  the  world  at 
large  it  claimed  a  national  independence,  subject  only 
to  appeal  to  a  General  Council  freely  chosen,  involv- 
ing a  right  to  determine  its  own  faith  and  discipline, 
under  the  guidance  of  Holy  Scripture,  and  with  due 
deference  to  the  traditions  of  the  Primitive  Church. 

In  the  next  place,  the  Prayer  Book  of  1559,  im- 
posed by  the  Act  of  Uniformity,  although  modelled 


HISTOEICAL  PREFACE.  vii 

on  the  whole  on  the  Second  Prayer  Book  of 
Edward  VI.,  nevertheless  indicated,  in  several  well- 
known  and  crucial  particulars,  a  desire  to  compre- 
hend those  who  were  attached  to  some  points  of 
the  Mediaeval  system,  without  retaining  their  alle- 
giance to  the  Pope  and  determinately  opposing  the 
work  of  reformation.  It  is  certain  that  for  a  time 
that  object  was  in  great  degree  accomplished,  till, 
in  fact,  the  formal  excommunication  of  Elizabeth 
broke  off  all  relations  with  Rome,  and  forced 
Englishmen  to  take  one  side  or  the  other.  In  this 
respect  it  breathed  more  of  the  spirit  of  the  first 
Prayer  Book  of  Edward  YL,  and  reiterated — what 
that  Prayer  Book  had  itself  distinctly  announced — 
the  resolution  of  the  Church  of  England  to  stand  on 
the  old  Catholic  basis,  and  to  preserve  the  continuity 
of  her  ecclesiastical  life  from  the  primitive  days. 

Lastly,  the  xlrticles,  although  (as  has  been  else- 
where noticed)  they  had  originally  a  provisional 
character,  hardly  aspiring  to  the  theoretical  com- 
pleteness of  some  of  the  Continental  Confessions,  yet, 
considered  in  their  main  groups,  indicate  still  more 
clearly  the  position  which  the  Church  of  England 
then  assumed.  For  they  start  with  that  group 
(Art.  i.-v.)  which  simply  rehearse?,  with  some 
slight  alterations  and  additions,  the  great  articles 
of  the  ancient  creed  of  Christendom,  and  which 
accordingly  claims  for  the  Church  of  England  the 
old    Catholic   groundwork   of  doctrine.     They  next 


vm  HISTOEICAL  PREFACE. 

(Art.  vi.-viil),  in  defining  ''the  Eule  of  Faith," 
boldly  take  up,  in  contradiction  to  the  Council  of 
Trent,  that  appeal  to  Holy  Scripture  "as  con- 
taining all  things  necessary  to  salvation,"  which 
had  struck  the  original  key-note  of  the  Refor- 
mation ;  and  they  assert  the  truth  of  the  Three 
Creeds  as  being  accordant  with  this  standard  of 
Holy  Scripture.  From  this  point  they  pass  on 
(Art.  ix.-xviii.)  to  consider  the  two  great  abstract 
doctrines  of  "Justification  by  Faith,"  and  of  indi- 
vidual Predestination  and  Election,  which  had  in- 
spired the  Lutheran  and  Calvinistic  movements; 
and  with  these  they  deal  in  a  spirit  of  complete 
independence,  using  the  confessions  and  writings  of 
Continental  Eeformers,  without  for  a  moment  follow- 
ing them  absolutely  ;  on  the  whole,  sympathizing  with 
the  Lutheran  doctrine,  and  on  the  whole  diverging 
from  the  Calvinistic,  but  in  both  cases  taking  up  a 
line  of  their  own.  Still  more  distinctively  Anglican 
is  the  definition,  in  the  groups  which  next  follow, 
first  (Art.  xix.-xxxvi.),  of  the  nature  and  authority 
of  the  Church,  of  the  sacredness  of  the  Christian 
Ministry,  of  the  doctrine  of  the  Sacraments,  and 
secondly  (Art.  xxxvir.-xxxix.),  of  the  Eoyal  Su- 
premacy, and  the  relation  both  of  the  Church  and 
the  individual  Christian  to  the  civil  power. 

Of  this  position,  complex  in  itself,  appealing  in 
due  measure  and  harmony  to  Scripture,  to  Church 
tradition,  and  to  Reason,  Hooker  is  the  systematic 


HISTOKICAL   PREFACE.  IX 

expounder  and  defender.  In  his  writings,  which 
(strictly  speaking)  belong  to  no  School,  we  have, 
better  perhaps  than  in  the  work  of  any  other 
English  divine,  the  representation  of  the  new  point 
of  departure,  from  which  the  Church  of  England 
started  on  her  career  as  a  Eeformed  Branch  of  the 
ancient  Catholic  Church. 

II.  The  position  so  taken  was  assailed,  of  course, 
from  the  side  of  the  Church  of  Rome.  It  was 
honoured  by  the  special  hostility  of  the  great 
counter-Reformation  movement,  of  which  the  soul 
was  in  the  Jesuit  order,  and  the  stereotyped  declara- 
tion of  principles  in  the  decrees  of  the  Council  of 
Trent.  The  champions  of  Rome  attacked  it  by 
various  weapons — by  the  spiritual  weapons  of  learn- 
ing, ability,  and  earnestness — by  the  ecclesiastical 
weapons  of  excommunication  and  denunciation — 
by  the  carnal  weapons  of  conspiracy  at  home  and 
invasion  from  abroad.  Against  all  alike  the  English 
Church  and  realm,  then  in  composition  identical, 
stood  fast  and  triumphed. 

But,  as  Hooker's  wTitings  show,  it  had  to  struggle 
against  the  power,  variously  called  Puritan,  Pres- 
byterian, or  Calvinistic,  within  its  own  bosom.  The 
essential  principle  of  antagonism,  however,  of  this 
power  to  the  constitution  of  the  English  Church,  as 
marked  in  the  Elizabethan  settlement,  lay  in  its 
Calvinistic  doctrine,  necessarily  inconsistent  with 
the   preservation   of  the   ancient   basis   of   Church 


X  HISTOEICAL   PEEFACE. 

Doctrine  and  Membership,  necessarily  impatient  of 
a  Keformation,  which  must  have  seemed  to  a  revo- 
lutionary party  a  timid  and  inconsistent  compromise. 
It  boldly  proclaimed  itself  the  one  true  Scriptural 
system,  claiming  a  Divine  Eight,  overriding  all 
other  claims  to  authority.  Meeting  the  excom- 
munication of  Eome  with  an  equally  intolerant 
rejoinder,  it  asserted  itself  as  the  only  true  bulwark 
against  Popery,  and  the  only  safeguard  of  that  indi- 
vidual and  personal  religion,  which  the  Papal  system 
would  override. 

Against  Calvinism  the  first  rebellion  within  the 
ranks  of  the  Eeformed  Churches  was  seen  in  Ar- 
minianism.  In  its  native  country  of  Holland, 
Arminianism  took  a  latitudinarian  and  anti-dogmatic 
form ;  it  aimed  at  the  simplification  of  the  basis  of 
faith  and  Church  membership,  and  shrank  from  the 
bold  attempt  to  weld  all  Christian  doctrine  into  an 
iron,  logical  system,  based  upon  God's  election, 
and  ready  to  sacrifice  to  coherency  all  unmanageable 
truth.  In  England,  on  the  contrary,  those  who 
(against  their  own  protest)  were  called  Arminians 
assumed  a  distinctively  Anglo-Catholic  position. 
They  met  Calvinism  by  the  assertion  of  its  incon- 
sistency with  the  ancient  doctrine  and  constitution 
of  the  primitive  Church,  as  expressed  in  the  decrees 
of  Councils  and  the  writings  of  the  Fathers.  While 
fully  accepting  the  basis  of  faith  in  Holy  Scripture, 
they  resolved  to  take  the  Bible  as  God  gave  it — 


HISTORICAL   PREFACE.  XI 

"  the  Bible  in  the  Church  " — and  accordinsrlv  to  allow 
full  weiglit  to  the  interpretation  of  ancient  Catholic 
authority.  They  met  the  claim  of  a  Divine  Riglit 
for  the  Presbyterian  polity  by  claiming  a  Divine 
Right  for  Episcopacy,  and  emphasizing  the  doctrine 
of  the  Apostolical  Succession.  They  asserted  against 
the  individualism  of  the  Puritan  theology  and 
worship,  the  reality  of  Sacramental  grace,  of  the 
power  of  Absolution,  of  the  authoritative  Ritual  of 
the  Church.  The  position,  thus  taken  up  in  opposi- 
tion to  the  Calvinistic  party,  they  held  staunchly 
also  against  Rome,  believing  it,  not  without  justifica- 
tion by  results,  to  be  the  strongest  permanent  ground 
of  resistance  to  her  claims.  But  they  were  often 
accused  of  Romanizing,  because  they  could  not,  and 
would  not,  take  the  rough  and  ready  way  of  retorting 
her  excommunication  upon  herself,  by  denouncing 
her  system  as  the  system  of  Antichrist,  and  placing 
her  children  out  of  the  pale  of  salvation. 

Of  this  School  Andre  WES  may  be  called  the  chief 
theologian,  as  Laud  was  the  great  champion  in  action. 
Unhappily  for  itself,  it  entered  into  alliance  more 
and  more  closely  under  the  Stuarts  with  the  cause 
of  the  absolutism  of  the  Crown,  though  it  never  for 
a  moment  approached  an  Erastian  position  of  mere 
subservience  to  the  temporal  power.  In  the  Royal 
authority — itself  held  to  be  of  Divine  Right — 
the  leaders  of  the  Anglo-Catholic  School  believed 
that   they  saw  a   breakwater  against  the  waves  of 


Xll  HISTOKICAL   PEEFACE. 

revolution,  and  a  means  of  enforcing  against  re- 
bellious opposition  the  Church  Order  and  Kitual,  on 
which  they  laid  principal  stress.  Accordingly,  they 
threw  themselves  unreservedly  into  the  cause  of 
advancing  despotism.  Mountague's  '  Appello  Csesa- 
rem,'  Mainwaring's  *  Passive  Obedience,'  were  but 
overt  declarations  of  a  policy  which  ran  through 
the  whole  of  Laud's  ecclesiastical  and  political 
career.  The  error  was,  for  the  time,  fatal.  With 
the  sudden  collapse  of  the  Koyal  Absolutism  their 
power  also  fell,  as  in  a  moment.  The  Calvinistic 
or  Puritan  party,  powerful  especially  in  the  middle 
classes  and  in  the  House  of  Commons,  formed 
a  bolder  and  happier  alliance  with  the  defenders 
of  jDolitical  liberty,  struck  out  in  Scotland  the  first 
spark  of  the  conflagration  which  utterly  consumed 
the  imposing  fabric  of  the  Stuart  despotism,  and 
accordingly,  triumphed  over  the  High  Church 
School,  with  a  triumph  which  seemed  permanent 
and  complete.  But  yet  it  is  not  a  little  remarkable 
that,  while  the  great  writers  of  the  Anglo-Catholic 
School  have  left  an  impress,  both  upon  the  English 
Church  and  the  English  Theology,  which  has  never 
been  lost,  the  Puritan  School,  great  as  were  its 
power  and  earnestness,  has  bequeathed  no  writing 
which  takes  a  permanent  place  in  English  theo- 
logical literature.  The  one  name  which  lives  in 
transcendant  greatness,  the  name  of  John  Milton, 
is   far   more   truly   representative  of  the  cause   of 


HISTORICAL   PREFACE.  XI U 

liberty,  individual,  political,  social,  than  of  the 
Puritan  theology.  It  is  to  his  ^  Areopagitica,'  and 
his  *  Defensio  Populi  Anglicani,'  rather  than  to  his 
distinctively  theological  works,  that  the  reader  of 
his  prose  writings  instinctively  turns. 

III.  Lying,  so  to  speak,  beyond  the  direct  range 
of  the  great  conflict,  there  was  a  party,  of  which 
Falkland  was  the  public  leader,  and  of  which  such 
men  as  Hales  and  Chillingworth  were  the 
literary  representatives.  For  a  time,  indeed,  Falk- 
land, and  in  some  degree  Hyde  with  him,  repre- 
sented in  the  Long  Parliament  the  cause  of  Consti- 
tutionalism in  Church  as  w^ell  as  State.  On  the 
great  question  of  Episcopacy,  for  example,  they 
were  equally  opposed  to  the  School  of  Laud, 
asserting  its  Divine  Eight  as  absolute,  and  to  the 
Presbyterian  party,  who  clamoured  against  it  as 
an  anti-Christian  usurpation.  But  in  the  fierceness 
of  the  struggle  they  were  soon  swej^t  away  from 
this  independent  position ;  and  it  is  significant 
that  in  almost  all  cases  they  finally  joined  the 
Royal  cause,  and  shared  the  persecution  which 
fell  on  the  defenders  of  the  Anglican  Church 
system. 

In  theology  they  may  be  roughly  described  as 
the  first  representatives  of  a  Latitudinarian  School. 
Probably  they  found  more  protection  or  toleration 
under  the  absolutism  of  Laud,  than  face  to  face  with 
the  intense  dogmatism  of  the  Puritan  party.     It  is 


XIV  HISTORICAL   PREFACE. 

significant  enough  that  Chillingworth  was  brought 
over  to  Rome  by  the  Jesuit  Fisher,  Laud's  an- 
tagonist in  controversy,  and  reclaimed  by  Laud 
himself ;  that  his  '  Religion  of  Protestants '  was  in- 
tended to  strengthen  the  positions  of  Laud's  '  Con- 
troversy with  Fisher,'  and  was  solemnly  burnt  over 
liis  grave  by  a  prominent  Puritan  divine.  But  at 
the  same  time  this  support  could  hardly  have  been 
other  than  a  dangerous  one,  inspired  as  it  was  by 
principles  which  must  have  weakened  or  dissolved 
the  strong  cohesion  of  the  High  Church  system. 
The  thoughts  of  this  School  (of  which  Chillingworth 
is  the  best  known  though  hardly  the  purest  repre- 
sentative) were  directed  by  the  principles  rather 
of  the  Continental  Arminians  than  of  the  English 
Anglo-Catholic  party.  They  would  have  laid  down 
a  simple  basis  of  Christianity,  such  as  the  *  Apostles' 
Creed '  might  supply,  such  as  they  believed  that, 
amidst  all  controversies  on  the  subtler  and  deeper 
teachings  of  Holy  Scripture,  every  reader  of  the 
Bible  might  discover  for  himself.  Within  the  limits 
so  laid  down,  they  pleaded  for  a  very  considerable 
latitude  of  thought,  even  in  the  criticism  of  Holy 
Scripture,  both  for  individuals  and  for  Churches,  with- 
out breach  of  Church  membership  or  communion, 
and  without  imputation  of  heresy  dangerous  to 
salvation.  On  forms  of  Church  Government  they 
were  so  far  indifferent,  that  they  held  none  to  be 
of  universal  and  necessary  obligation ;  though  most 


HISTORICAL  PREFACE.  XV 

of  them  would  in  all  probability  have  accepted  a 
modified  and  limited  Episcopacy — such  as  was  after- 
wards suggested  by  Ussher — as  being  the  most  vener- 
able, the  soundest,  and  the  freest  form  of  government. 
On  Sacramental  Doctrine  and  the  Power  of  the  Keys, 
they  were  inclined  at  all  times  to  protest  against 
over-dogmatic  definition,  occasionally  to  approach  to 
the  merely  Zuinglian  theory.  It  is  clear,  therefore, 
that  they  really  symbolized  with  neither  party  in  the 
great  struggle.  They  inclined  to  the  High  Church 
side,  simply  because,  in  respect  of  dogmatic  narrow- 
ness and  of  sacrifice  of  everything  to  coherency  of 
logical  theory,  the  little  finger  of  Puritanism  in  its 
earlier  developments  was  thicker  than  the  loins  of 
the  Laudian  School.  For  the  time  their  voice  was 
but  little  heard ;  their  principles  were  only  to  bear 
fruits  in  later  days.  But  they  form  a  distinct  and 
characteristic  School  in  English  Theology ;  and,  as 
such,  deserve  to  be  studied  in  some  one  re})resenta- 
tive  work. 

IV.  The  immediate  triumph  of  Calvinism  was 
marked  at  the  Westminster  Assembly  (in  1643)  by 
the  adoption  of  the  Covenant  and  the  nmv  Con- 
fession of  Faith,  and  by  the  partial  establishment 
of  a  Presbyterian  system,  moulded  nearly  on  the 
Scotch  type.  By  no  mere  accident  it  coincided  with 
the  wanton  and  vindictive  execution  of  Laud,  the  life- 
long antagonist  of  its  ascendancy.  But  the  hour  of 
its  triumph  was  apparently  the  first  hour  of  its  decay. 


XVI  HISTOEICAL   PREFACE. 

The  Calvinistic  body  was  split  into  diverse  and 
antagonistic  schools  by  the  rise  of  "  the  Sectaries," 
especially  the  Independents ;  and  by  the  concep- 
tion not  only  of  religions  toleration,  but  of  recog- 
nised religious  diversity — utterly  hateful  to  the 
true  Presbyterian  party — which  the  Congregational 
theory  brought  with  it.  The  Calvinistic  theology, 
as  such,  probably  took  no  deep  hold  on  the  English 
mind — now  that  it  was  dissociated  from  the  struggle 
for  political  liberty,  and  accordingly  contemplated 
in  the  ruthless  severity  of  its  dogmatic  theory.  For 
Englishmen  have  always  preferred  the  recognition  of 
all  the  facts  of  any  case,  however  irreconcilable  they 
may  seem,  to  the  sacrifices  which  a  perfect  logical 
system  invariably  demands,  before  it  can  square 
to  its  required  limits  the  complex  variety  of  human 
nature  and  human  life. 

The  most  notable  rebellion  against  its  predomi- 
nance arose  in  the  celebrated  school  of  the  Cambridge 
Platonists,  of  which  Whichcote — himself  a  scholar 
of  the  Puritan  College  of  Emmanuel,  and  raised  to  the 
Provostship  of  King's  College  by  the  Parliament  in 
1643 — was  the  father.  How  complete  that  rebellion 
was  will  be  seen  by  a  glance  at  the  sketch,  given  in  the 
Fourth  Lecture  of  this  series,  of  the  main  positions 
which  he  assumed,  and  which  his  followers  main- 
tained and  enlarged.  They  remind  us  in  essence  of 
the  great  principles  of  the  First  Book  of  the  *  Eccle- 
siastical Polity.'     But  they  are  carried  out  Avith  a 


HISTOKICAL   PREFACE.  XVU 

singular  completeness,  wliicli  '*  represents  much  that 
is  most  generous  and  noblest  in  the  '  moral  divinity  ' 
of  to-day."  The  accordance  of  Reason  and  Faith, 
and  the  harmony  of  tlie  Natural  and  the  Super- 
natural, ^vhicli  have  seldom  been  more  boldly  an- 
nounced, must  have  sounded  a  note  of  defiance  to 
the  Calvinistic  dogmatism.  Tlie  belief  in  a  true 
Image  of  God,  not  obliterated  by  the  Fall,  placed 
Whichcote  in  direct  antagonism  to  the  Puritanism, 
discontented  even  with  the  "  very  far  gone  from 
original  rigliteousness  "  of  our  IXth  Article,  desiring 
to  substitute  for  it  the  uncompromising  phrase, 
"  utterly  deprived,"  and  to  add  to  the  belief  in  an 
"  infection  of  nature  "  the  conception  of  an  im])uta- 
tion  of  the  guilt  of  Adam's  sin  to  his  posterity.  The 
large  comprehensiveness,  which  held  that  "nothing 
is  desperate  in  the  condition  of  good  men,"  and  con- 
ceived hopes  even  of  **mere  Naturalists,"  could  not 
but  stir  suspicion  and  vehement  opposition  in  every 
champion  of  true  Puritanism.  The  School,  which  he 
may  be  said  to  have  founded — itself  hardly  to  be 
described  by  so  definite  a  phrase — stood  between  the 
dominant  Puritanism  and  the  irreligious  reaction 
which  it  provoked,  and  of  which  the  system  of 
Hobbes  was  the  terrible  representative.  By  both  it 
was  denounced ;  on  the  one  side  because  it  recog- 
nised natural  reason ;  on  the  other  because  it  held 
firmly  to  a  supernatural  faith.  Its  immediate  in- 
fluence was  probably  not  great.   Whichcote  *'  left  no 

[KI^'G'S   COLL.]  h 


XVIU  HISTOKICAL   PREFACE. 

successors  in  a  third  generation."  But  it  anticipated 
thoughts  and  principles,  which  have  lived  on,  and 
started  out  into  prominence  again  and  again.  It 
well  deserves  to  be  represented,  either  by  Whichcote 
or  some  of  his  followers,  in  any  series  of  Masters  in 
English  Theology. 

V.  Meanwhile  "  Prelacy,"  or,  in  other  words,  the 
old  Church  system  of  1559,  persecuted  during  the 
supremacy  of  the  Calvinistic  Puritanism,  excluded 
from  all  place  in  the  Committee  of  Triers  under  the 
Protectorate,  virtually  proscribed  by  the  imposition 
of  "  the  Engagement "  and  by  ejectment  from  bene- 
fices and  even  from  chaplaincies  and  tutorships, 
nevertheless  preserved  a  quiet  vitality,  and  bided  its 
time.  Nothing  is  more  remarkable  than  the  com- 
pleteness of  its  restoration  in  1662,  without  any 
effort  of  reassertion ;  the  reaction  against  the  dog- 
matic yoke  of  Calvinism  and  the  ecclesiastical  dis- 
integration of  ''  the  Sectaries,"  was  so  absolutely 
irresistible,  that  Charles  IL,  probably  in  his  own 
mind  not  disinclined  to  keep  the  promises  of  the 
Declaration  of  Breda,  yielded  to  it  without  a  struggle. 
But  a  lesson  had  been  learnt  by  the  failure  and 
sudden  collapse  of  the  rigid  Laudian  system,  not 
lost  even  upon  those  who  had  grown  up  in  that 
School.  A  change  came  over  the  spirit  of  the  High 
Church  Theology,  not  seriously  affecting  the  positive 
principles  of  the  School  of  Andrewes,  but  inclining  to 
a  larger  comprehensiveness  and  toleration,  in  respect 


HISTORICAL   PREFACE.  xix 

both  of  euforcement  by  law,  and  of  obligation  inforo 
conseientia3. 

This  change  is  visible,  not  only  in  the  *'  mo- 
derate Episcopacy,"  limited  by  synodical  concur- 
rence, of  Ussher,  who  belonged  to  a  Puritan  School 
and  actually  supported,  in  1609,  the  adoption  of  the 
Lambeth  Articles,  or  in  the  *  Irenicum '  of  Stilling- 
fleet,  brought  up  at  Cambridge  at  the  time  when 
the  influence  of  Whichcote  was  powerful,  and  in  his 
early  days  inclining  to  the  Latitudinarian  School. 
It  is  traceable  even  in  such  men  as  Bramhall,  the 
scholar  of  Laud,  and  the  favourite  of  Strafford,  when, 
on  the  reconstruction  in  Ireland  after  1061,  he  de- 
clined to  pronounce  the  nullity  of  Presbyterian  ordi- 
nation in  that  country  and  "much  less  in  foreign 
Churches."  It  is  still  more  distinct  in  Sanderson, 
professing  himself  a  disciple  of  Hooker,  and  proving 
himself  in  the  '  De  Obligatione  Conscientise '  not 
unworthy  of  the  name,  of  whom  it  is  notable  that  he 
was  named  (though  he  never  sat)  as  a  member  of 
the  Westminster  Assembly,  and  yet  was  afterwards 
a  leader  in  the  Savoy  Conference  on  the  dominant 
side,  and  the  author  of  the  Preface  to  the  Prayer 
Book  in  1662.  But  the  most  renowned  representative 
of  this  new  phase  of  Theology  is  undoubtedly  Jeremy 
Taylor.  In  his  exuberant  fancy,  his  vast  and  in- 
discriminate learning,  his  extraordinary  rhetorical 
power,  not  untouched  by  the  higher  inspiration  of 
true  poetry,  his  marvellous  copiousness,  |X)uring  out 


XX  HISTORICAL   PREFACE. 

iu  one  full  tide,  argument,  illustration,  exliortation, 
devotion — he  stands  absolutely  alone.  But  in  his 
Theology  he  bears  the  impress  of  his  time;  he 
appears  to  be  the  first  great  specimen  of  a  "  Liberal 
Hio:h  Churchman." 

He  was  one  of  those  whose  genius  Laud  discovered 
and  fostered ;  for  it  is  not  a  little  remarkable  that 
the  man,  on  whom  many  delight  to  heap  the  reproach 
of  utter  narrowness  and  bigotry,  should  have  been 
the  friend  and  protector  of  Hales,  the  reconverter 
of  Chillingworth,  and  the  patron  of  Jeremy  Taylor. 
On  such  points  as  the  assertion  of  Episcopacy  and  the 
power  of  the  Keys,  high  Sacramental  doctrine  and 
appeal  to  Patristic  antiquity,  Taylor  belonged  to  the 
school  of  Andrewes  and  Laud.  On  Original  Sin  and 
the  Doctrine  of  Kepentance  he  Avas  so  vehemently 
anti-Calvinistic,  as  to  be  supposed  to  verge  on 
Pelagianism,  But  the  'Liberty  of  Prophesying' 
strikes  the  key-note,  both  of  comprehension  and 
toleration,  with  a  power  unequalled  before,  and 
hardly  equalled  since,  on  all  the  cardinal  points  of 
the  subject — the  simplification  of  the  terms  of 
Communion  for  individuals  and  for  churches — the 
reference  of  true  heresy,  not  to  error  of  understand- 
ing but  to  sin  of  will — the  duty  of  all  but 
unlimited  toleration,  both  in  State  and  in  Church, 
to  speculative  error,  as  such — the  assertion  of  the 
true  province  of  reason,  and  the  right  of  private 
judgment   in   matters   of  religion.     It   is  probably 


HTSTOllICAL   PREFACE.  XXI 

true  that  his  own  exuberant  activity  and  copious- 
ness of  ideas  may  have  disinclined  him  to  precise 
dogmatic  statement,  and  introduced  some  incon- 
sistencies into  his  various  utterances.  But  the  po- 
sition which  seems  to  belong  to  him  as  a  theologian, 
although  then  absolutely  new  and  at  all  times  rare,  is 
a  perfectly  consistent  and  intelligible  one — holding 
firmly  to  the  belief  in  an  Absolute  Truth,  and  a 
continuity  of  supernatural  life  and  grace  in  the 
Church,  yet  so  trusting  to  spiritual  weapons,  as  to 
refuse  to  guard  Truth  by  persecution  or  anathema, 
or  to  strengthen  Church  unity  by  the  iron  bonds  of 
external  compulsion.  Happily  this  principle  may 
fairly  claim  its  place  in  any  representation  of  the 
chief  characteristics  of  English  Theology. 

YI.  In  marked  contrast  with  Jeremy  Taylor,  at 
once  in  respect  of  individual  character  and  genius, 
and  in  the  nature  of  his  theological  teaching,  stands 
John  Pearson,  nearly  his  contemporary  in  age, 
but  in  thought  more  closely  connected  with  the 
later  aspects  of  English  Theology.  He  had  passed, 
like  Taylor,  through  the  experiences  of  the  col- 
lapse of  the  Laudian  rule,  the  dominance  of  the 
Calvinistic  system,  the  discord  of  the  sects.  He 
had  Mt  the  attack  on  the  old  Anglican  position 
which  he  loved,  from  the  old  antagonism  of  Rome 
and  Geneva;  he  had  seen  the  gradual  advance  of 
the  Baconian  system  of  philosophy,  and  the  startling 
emert^ence   of  the   brilliant   theories   of  Descartes. 


XXll  HISTORICAL    PEEFACE. 

As  he  was  by  nature  pre-eminently  a  scholar  and 
a  critic,  and  a  close  and  systematic  thinker,  the 
effect  on  his  mind  was,  first,  to  drive  him  to  examine 
jealously  the  basis  of  Faith  in  Holy  Scripture,  and 
in  those  ancient  Church  traditions  which  earlier 
divines  had  accepted  too  much  en  masse,  counting 
rather  than  weighing  authorities,  and  discriminating 
too  little  between  the  true  and  the  spurious,  the 
clear  and  the  doubtful ;  next,  to  teach  him  on  that 
basis  to  build  up  systematically  a  solid  superstructure, 
closely  welded  together  by  logical  deduction,  re- 
jecting all  that  could  only  be  made  to  cohere 
loosely  with  it,  by  uncertain  inference,  by  fanciful 
association,  by  supposed  necessity  of  completeness  of 
idea;  and  lastly,  to  lead  him  to  hold  firmly  and 
fairly  the  position  so  occupied,  without  the  impulse 
either  of  strong  antagonism  or  of  large  sympathy, 
towards  those  w^ho  occupied  ground,  which  seemed 
to  him  less  solid,  on  the  right  hand  or  on  the  left. 
In  all  these  characteristics,  in  solidity  and  com- 
pactness of  thought,  in  learning — wide  indeed,  but 
pre-eminently  well  digested  and  solid — in  a  true 
scholarly  instinct  for  clearness,  accuracy,  moderation 
of  statement,  Pearson  anticipates  much  of  what  is 
best  in  the  theology  of  the  Eestoration  divines  and 
those  who  succeeded  them. 

The  *  Exposition  of  the  Creed,'  and  the  *  Vindiciae 
Ignatianse '  are  perfect  in  their  own  way.  Without 
one   touch   of  Taylor's   exuberant  genius,   Pearson 


HISTORICAL  PREFACE.  XXI 11 

commands  far  more  confidence  as  an  abstract  theo- 
logian ;  with  no  power  to  kindle  enthusiasm  or 
sympathy,  and  with  little  capacity  for  bringing  out 
the  relation  of  his  own  closely  reasoned  principles 
to  other  forms  of  thought,  theological  or  scientific, 
his  work  stands  in  a  hard  characteristic  insularity, 
which  at  least  gives  a  firm  foothold  amidst  the 
changing  winds  of  speculation,  and  against  the  dis- 
integrating power  of  criticism,  and  enables  the 
mind  to  look  out  calmly  and  impartially,  holding  its 
own,  and  never  unnecessarily  attacking  the  positions 
of  others. 

Alike  in  his  excellences  and  his  defects,  Pearson  is 
especially  a  representative  of  a  distinctively  Angli- 
can Theology,  at  a  time  when,  by  necessity,  the 
peculiarities  of  the  Anglican  position  had  to  be 
resolutely  defined  and  maintained. 


Such  is  a  brief  sketch  of  the  historical  relation  in 
which  these  "six  Masters  in  Theology"  stand,  both 
to  one  another,  and  to  the  general  current  of  the 
thought  and  history  of  the  eventful  century  to  which 
they  belong.  It  is  designed  to  be,  in  the  true  sense, 
a  simple  Preface,  preparatory  to  the  study  of  tlie 
Lectures,  which  will  bring  out  in  fuller  detail  the 
great  salient  points  of  the  life  and  thought  of  each 
writer,  and  by  which  some  idea  may  be  gained  of 
the  variety  of  the  phases  of  our  English  Theology 


XXIV  HISTORICAL   PREFACE. 

in  its  best  days,  and  of  the  order  of  continuity 
which  runs  through  them  all.  It  is  hoped  in  some 
future  year  to  attempt  another  series,  dealing  with 
the  Theologians  and  Evidence-writers  of  the  next 
century. 

A.  B. 


King's  College,  London, 
October  1877. 


RICHARD    HOOKER 

Born-  a.d.  1553-4;    Died  a.d.  1600. 


Introduction. — I.  Brief  reference  to  Hooker's  life  and  times. — 
II.  The  character  of  the  English  Eeformation  (a)  defined  by  the 
Elizabethan  settlement  as  against  Rome ;  (h)  challenged  by  the 
"Puritan"  School — Puritan  in  Ritual,  Presl)yterian  in  Church 
Government,  Calvinistic  in  doctrine;  (c)  Hooker's  answer  to  the 
challenge,  examining  the  fundamental  fallacy  of  the  Puritan 
system,  in  the  'Ecclesiastical  Polity.' — III.  Its  three  Sections. 
(A.)  The  First  Section  (Books  I.  to  III.).  Book  I.,  on  the 
Unity  of  Law — the  Harmony  of  the  Natural  and  the  Super- 
natural— the  Mutability  or  Immutability  of  Law.  Books  II. 
and  III.  polemical  corollaries  from  it. — (B.)  The  Second  Section 
(Books  IV.  and  V.; ;  the  Defence  of  Church  Ritual  (a)  against 
the  charge  of  Romanizing;  (b)  on  its  own  merits — Hooker's 
Three  Great  Axioms  examined — His  method  illustrated  in  re- 
lation to  Sacramental  Doctrine.—  (C)  The  Third  Section  f  Books 
VI.— Till.):  (a)  Loss  of  Book  VI.,  on  Lay  Eldership;  (h)  The 
historical  treatment  of  Episcopacy  in  Book  VII.,  compared  with  the 
method  of  subsequent  Theologians ;  (c)  The  Theory  of  Church  and 
State  in  Book  VIII.,  in  part  rendered  obsolete  by  facts,  in  part 
applicable  mutatis  mutandis. — IV.  Conclusion  :  Hooker's  place 
in  English  Literature — Peculiar  historical  interest  and  jjerma- 
nent  value  of  his  work  in  English  Theology. 

The  general  purpose  of  the  following  Lectures  is  to 
bring  out,  in  the  persons  of  six  chief  "  Masters  in 
English  Theology,"  the  chief  phases  through  which 
our  English  theology  passed,  in  the  great  period 
intervening  between  the  Elizabethan  settlement  at 
[king's  coll.]  B 


Z  MASTEKS  IN   ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

the  close  of  the  Reformation  and  the  end  of  the 
Restoration  epoch — a  period  which  in  great  degree 
determined  the  future  Constitution  of  England,  both 
in  Church  and  State. 

They  take  for  granted  in  their  hearers  or  readers, 
a  sense  first  of  the  importance  of  Theology,  as  a 
form  of  true  scientific  thought,  bearing  upon  reli- 
gious feeling  and  religious  action  ;  and  next  of  what 
in  these  days  is  universally  recognised — the  value  of 
the  historical  method  of  investigation,  as  truer,  and 
therefore  more  fruitful,  than  any  system  of  abstract 
theory. 

But,  while  these  things  may  be  assumed  in  all  who 
are  likely  to  read  these  Lectures,  I  believe  that  many 
who  talk  of  "  our  old  English  Divines,"  although 
(rightly  enough)  they  speak  of  them  with  respect 
and  pride  as  of  a  noble  school  of  writers,  and  perhaps 
have  a  tolerably  clear  idea  that  theology  was  in  those 
days  a  leading  and  effective  power  in  English  opinion 
and  life,  yet  perhaps  are  too  apt  to  think  of  them, 
as  if  they  were  all  more  or  less  stamped  with  the 
same  general  impress — ignorant  at  once  of  the  rich 
variety  of  the  phases  of  thought  which  they  severally 
represent,  and  of  the  order  of  development  clearly 
traceable  in  our  English  theology,  and  corresponding 
with  the  course  of  the  history,  which,  under  God's 
Providence,  has  made  our  Church  and  State  what 
they  actually  are.  If  this  be  so,  I  trust  that  the 
study  of  such  writers  as  Hooker,  Andrewes,  and  Chil- 


KICHAKD   HOOKER.  6 

lingworth,  belonging  to  the  period  before  the  gYeat 
Civil  War,  and  of  ^Yhichcote,  Jeremy  Taylor,  and 
Pearson,  beloDging  to  that  period  and  the  Eesto- 
ration  period  which  followed  it,  may  be  useful  in 
helping  us  to  gain  a  truer  conception  of  the  breadth, 
freedom,  and  variety,  which  (within  certain  Avell- 
defined  limits)  have  characterized  our  English 
theology,  and  reflected  themselves  in  the  ritual 
and  the  life  of  our  English  Church. 

We  start  from  the  Keformation,  not  as  forgetting 
the  great  principle,  which  was  throughout  that  Ee- 
formation  kept  steadily  in  view — the  continuity  of 
the  life  of  the  English  Church  from  its  original 
foundation — but  simply  because  the  Eeformation 
determined  for  the  Anglican  Church  a  certain  dis- 
tinctive and  unique  position,  from  which  I  can 
hardly  believe  that  it  will  ever  recede ;  and  because 
it  also,  by  no  mere  accidental  coincidence,  marked 
the  beginning  of  our  distinctively  English  literature. 
Accordingly,  I  have  to  speak  of  Eichaed  Hooker^ 
who  is  our  first  great  systematic  English  theologian ^ 
as  he  is  also  one  of  the  first  and  noblest  writers  of 
English  prose.  I  think  I  may  rightly  describe  him 
as  the  one  great  divine,  in  whose  writings  we  trace — 
drawn  out  in  explicit  perfection,  and  defended  with 
a  massive  strength  of  thought  and  learning — the  prin- 
ciples implied  in  the  Elizabethan  settlement.  Eor  I 
hold  that  this  settlement,  after  the  vague  jDre^Dara- 
tory  movements  under  Henry  VIIL,  and  the  two 

B  2 


4  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

more  decided  but  opposing  currents  of  action  and 
reaction  under  Edward  VI.  and  Mary,  defined  per- 
manently the  position  of  the  English  Church,  as  at 
once — I  use  a  good  old-fashioned  phrase — "  Catholic 
and   Protestant,"    connected   indissolubly  with   the 
system  of  the  primitive  Church,  and  yet  resolved,  at 
whatever  cost,  to  clear  itself  from  the  corruptions  of 
faith  and  practice  which  had  gradually  encrusted  it. 
(I.)  It  is  as  a  theologian  that  I  desire  to  regard 
Hooker.     Accordingly,   in    any   case,    it    would   be 
needless  here  to  dwell  at  any  length  on  the  story  of 
his  life.     But  this  is,  as  it  happens,  especially  need- 
less ;  first,  because  in  itself  that  life  was  quiet  and 
uneventful,  spent  mainly  in  a  studious  retirement, 
far  from  the  glare  of  dignities  and  the  turmoil  of 
political  and  social  struggles  ;  next,  because  Izaak 
Walton's  *Life  of  Hooker,'  which  is  in  all  probability 
as   authentic   in   general   fact  as   it  is  quaint   and 
beautiful  in  style,  is  in  all  men's  hands.     With  Mr. 
Keble,  indeed,  we  may  well  doubt  whether  Walton 
has  not  unconsciously  infused  into  his  biography  of 
Hooker  too  much  of  the  tone  and  spirit  of  his  own 
cliaracter.      The  massive  strength  of  thought,  the 
shrewd  common  sense,  the  singular  power  of  grave 
but  most  effective  irony,  which  we  trace  in  Hooker's 
writings,  seem  hardly  compatible  with  such  meek 
and  all  but  childisli  simplicity  as  Walton  attributes 
to  him  ;  or,  at  any  rate,  must  argue  the  existence  in 
Hooker  of  certain  elements  of  character,  which  his 


EICHAED   HOOKEK.  5 

biographer  could  not  understand,  and  therefore  could 
not  represent.  But  still  we  need  no  more  than 
Walton  has  given  us  for  the  main  outline  of  Hooker's 
history — *  his  early  education,  and  his  happy  college 
days  (1567-1584),  in  their  unwearied  study  and  not 
less  unwearied  devotion ;  his  passage  (in  1584,  after 
his  strange  marriage),  into  "the  corroding  cares  that 
attend  a  married  priest  and  a  country  parsonage ;" 
the  single  period  during  which,  as  Master  of  tlie 
Temple  (1585-1591),  he  miugled  with  the  busy  life 
and  ecclesiastical  controversies  of  London ;  his  glad 
retirement  to  the  quiet  of  Boscombe  and  Bishops- 
borne  (1591-1()00),  thereto  complete  his  great  work, 
of  which  only  the  foundations  were  laid  at  the  4  emple  ; 
there  to  devote  himself  to  the  simple,  quiet  duties  of 
a  parish  priest,  although  even  there  calumny  of  the 
worst  kind  pursued  him,  till  the  exertions  of  his 
friends  and  puj)ils  dispelled  it;  there  to  die,  only 
desirous  to  complete  his  *  Ecclesiastical  Polity,' 
and  then  to  cry,  "  Lord,  let  Thy  servant  depart  in 
peace ; "  with  those  most  characteristic  words  on 
his  lips,  which  told  of  the  *'  blessed  obedience  and 
order  of  the  angels,  without  which  peace  could  not 
be   in   heaven,   and,    oh !   that  it   might  be   so  on 


*  Now  and  tijeu  there  are  I  1579,  by  Dr.  Barfoote ;  and  the 
points  which  we  should  like  to  ■  groundson  which  tlie  calumnious 
know  more  about;  as  (for  in-  |  accusation  against  Hookf-r  is 
stance)  the  cause  of  the  expul-  '  attributed  to  "  a  dirftenting 
sion  of  Eeyuolds  and  Hooker  and  brother." 
three  other  Fellows  of  Corpus  in 


6  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOOY  : 

earth."  "  I  could  wish  "  (he  added  with  his  dying 
breath),  "  to  live  to  do  the  Church  more  service,  but 
cannot  hope  it."  But  "  God  hath  heard  my  daily 
petitions ;  for  I  am  at  peace  with  all  men,  and  He 
with  me."  Walton's  life  is  undoubtedly  a  panegyric  ; 
his  portrait  of  Hooker  suffers  accordingly  from 
being  drawn  without  shadows.  But  yet  it  is  no 
fanciful  portrait.  In  depicting  the  sweetness,  the 
meekness,  and  the  saintliness  of  Hooker's  character, 
it  is  clearly  true  to  the  life,  as  far  as  it  goes, 
although  perhaps  there  are  some  stronger  and 
sterner  features  which  it  has  missed. 

Looking  at  Hooker,  then,  as  a  theologian,  there  are 
certain  points  which  it  is  of  interest  to  note  in  this 
narrative  of  his  life.  We  observe  that  he  was  educated 
in  a  Calvinistic  school,  under  the  tutorship  of  Dr. 
Eeynolds  and  the  patronage  of  Bishop  Jewel,  the 
great  champion  of  the  Keformation,  inclining,  in 
spite  of  his  great  learning,  to  the  more  advanced 
Protestant  party  ;  so  that  he  must  have  worked  out 
for  himself,  by  simple  force  of  thought  and  learning, 
the  grander  and  more  Catholic  principles  which  he 
maintained.  W^e  observe  that  his  life  coincided 
almost  exactly  with  the  great  reign  of  Elizabeth  in 
England;  with  the  Huguenot  struggle  in  France 
(ending  with  the  abjuration  of  Henry  IV.  in  1593, 
and  the  Edict  of  Nantes  in  1598) ;  with  the  rise  of  the 
Jesuit  power  and  the  counter-Eeformation  on  the 
Continent ;  with  the  long  contest  between  Spain  and 


RICHARD   HOOKER.  7 

England,  virtually  ending  with  the  execution  of 
Mary  Queen  of  Scots,  in  1587,  and  the  defeat  of  the 
Armada  in  1588.  We  note  that  the  last  ten  years 
of  the  sixteenth  century  and  of  his  life,  "  saw  besides 
the  five  books  of  the  *  Ecclesiastical  Polity,'  the  publi- 
cation of  the  first  works  of  Shakspeare,  the  first  Essays 
of  Bacon,  and  the  ^ Faery  Queene'  of  Spenser."* 
Quiet  as  was  his  life,  singularly  original  as  was  his 
mind,  it  cannot  be  unimportant,  in  judging  of  his  great 
theological  work,  to  estimate  the  influences  of  his 
early  education,  of  the  spirit  of  so  great  and  critical 
an  age,  and  of  the  intellectual  impulse,  which  was  then 
giving  birth  to  the  unequalled  development  of  English 
literature  at  the  close  of  the  Elizabethan  period. 

Still  few  works  stand  so  much  alone  as  his.  It  is 
said  with  truth  that  he  founded  no  school.  The 
'  Ecclesiastical  Polity '  (like  Butler's  Analogy),  stands 
out  in  a  magnificent  isolation  among  the  lesser 
writings  of  the  day.  Such,  perhaps,  is  the  general 
position  of  any  work  which  is  to  be  a  /crfj/jba  e?  ael, 
marking  an  epoch  in  religious  or  philosophical 
thought.  It  belongs  to  no  school:  for  that  very 
reason  (like  the  Socratic  teaching  in  the  Greek 
philosophy),  it  influences  all. 

11.  His  time  was  a  critical  one.     The  Keformation, 


*  I  quote  from  the  admirable    astical  Polity'  (Clarendon  Press, 
Introduction  of  the  Dean  of  St.  j  1868),  to  which  all  students  of 
Paul's  to  that  excellent  edition  !  Hooker  are  deeply  indebted, 
of  the  First  Book  of  the  '  Ecclesi- 


8  MASTERS  IN   ENGLISH    THEOLOGY  : 

and  especially  the  English  Keformation,  was  on  its 
trial.  That  English  Reformation,  being  emphatically 
a  reformation  and  not  a  formal  reconstruction,  had 
naturally  been  gradual  and  unsystematic,  guided  by 
no  formal  theory,  dominated  by  no  master-mind — its 
principles  slowly  working  themselves  out,  in  the 
directions  suggested  from  time  to  time  by  the  needs, 
the  aspirations,  the  possibilities  of  each  generation. 
It  was  at  once  its  glory  and  its  reproach  that  it  was 
essentially  Conservative ;  keeping,  that  is,  to  the  old 
historic  Constitution  at  once  of  Faith  and  Polity, 
altering  it,  indeed,  with  no  want  of  boldness  and 
i'reedom,  but  never  sweeping  it  away,  in  order  to 
plant  a  new  systematic  constitution  in  its  place.  It 
was,  in  fact,  a  growth,  not  an  artificial  formation — 
having  all  the  irregularities  and  imperfections  of  a 
natural  development,  but  having  also  the  secret  of 
permanence,  in  virtue  of  its  adaptation  to  the  cha- 
racter and  the  progress  of  the  English  people.* 

{a)  Now  the  close  of  that  Reformation  movement, 
as  acknowledged  and  guided  by  authority,  is  marked 
by  the  Elizabethan  settlement.! 

That  settlement  still  preserved  the  character  of 
the  movement  itself.  It  was  still  very  far  from 
systematic ;    it  contented  itself  in  the  main  with 


*  See  a  fuller  description  of 
these  characteristics  in  the 
Second  Lecture  (on  Bishop 
Andrewes). 


t  I  speak  of  the  movement  it- 
self, not  of  its  consequences,  wbich 
gradually  worked  themselves  out 
till  the  final  settlement  of  1661. 


RICHAKD   HOOKER. 


9 


asserting  general  principles,  and  meeting  actual 
needs.  This  will  be  seen  at  once  by  a  glance  at  the 
two  great  national  Acts  which  defined  it — the  Act 
of  Supremacy  and  the  Act  of  Uniformity. 

The  Act  of  Supremacy  was  virtually  the  assertion 
of  two  great  principles.  Towards  those  w  ithout,  it 
asserted  the  independence  of  a  National  Church ; 
always  conditioned  in  principle  by  obedience  to  the 
law  of  Holy  Scripture,  as  interpreted  by  the  ancient 
Church  Catholic ;  always  subjected  in  practice  to  an 
appeal  to  a  General  Council,  freely  chosen.*  Towards 
those  within,  it  asserted  the  rights  of  the  laity,  as 
well  as  the  clergy,  in  the  Church  (both  under  rule 
of  the  Sovereign)  in  the  legislative  determination 
of  truth,  law,  and  ritual,  and  in  the  judicial  and 
executive  enforcement  of  all  that  was  determined 
by  such  legislation.! 


*  The  great  points  of  the 
original  Act  of  1532  (24  Henry 
VIII.)  are  thus  drawn  out  by 
Mr.  Gladstone : — 

1.  The  assertion  of  the  ancient 
independence  of  the  realm  of 
England. 

2.  The  division  of  the  nation 
into  the  clergy  or  spiritualty  and 
the  laity  or  temporalty. 

3.  The  supremacy  of  the  Crown 
in  all  causes  whatsoever  over 
both. 

4.  The  authority,  fitness,  and 
usage  of  the  spiritualty  to  ad- 
minister the  laws  spiritiial. 


5.  Its  endowment  for  this  very 
end. 

6.  The  parallel  authority,  fit- 
ness, and  usage  of  the  temporalty 
to  administer  the  laws  temporal. 

7.  The  alliance  between  these 
jurisdictions. 

'  Remarks  on  the  Royal  Su- 
premacy,' p.  43  (1850). 

t  It  is  notable  that  in  the 
settlement  of  the  Prayer  Book 
and  the  Articles,  the  Houses  of 
Parliament  successfully  asserted 
their  right  to  discuss  them  upon 
their  merits,  when  the  Queen, 
jealous  of  her  prerogative,  and 


10  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

The  Act  of  Uniformity  defined  the  religious 
standards  of  the  Church,  adopted  in  virtue  of  this 
independence,  in  the  Prayer  Book  and  the  Articles. 

The  Prayer  Book — in  its  very  construction  exem- 
plifying at  once  a  firm  grasp  of  the  old  Catholic 
truth  and  ritual,  and  a  fearless  claim  of  a  right 
to  modify  its  form  and  development— was  intended 
to  be,  and  has  actually  been,  a  standard,  not  only 
of  ritual,  but  of  our  national  faith  and  national 
tone  of  religion.  But  its  very  power  to  mould 
thought  and  feeling  lay  in  the  fact  that  it  was  un- 
systematic, implying  doctrine  at  every  point,  but 
seldom  or  never  drawing  it  out  into  explicit  dogmatic 
form. 

The  Articles,  moulded  out  of  the  Forty-two 
Articles  of  Edward  YI.,  closely  connected  with  the 
Lutheran  Confessions,  and  so  bearing  a  distinct  im- 
press of  the  great  controversies  of  the  day,  approach 
(of  course)  far  more  closely  to  a  systematic  form. 
Yet  it  is  characteristic  that  even  these  were  designed 
to  meet  a  present  need.  They  are  but  certain 
"  Articles  of  Keligion,"*  drawn  up  with  the  prac- 


dreading  the  Puritanizing  ten-  I  Bishops  and  other  learned  men 
denciesofthe  House  of  Commons,  '  in  Synod  of  London  in  1552,  for 
desired  to  base  them  simply  on  ^  avoiding     of    controversy     and 


the  authority  of  the  Crown, 
acting  by  the  advice  of  Convo- 
cation. 

*  The  Forty-two  Articles  are 
entitled  Articles  "  agreed  on  by 


establishment  of  godly  concord 
on  certain  matters  of  Religion." 
Our  Thirty-nine  Articles  were 
more  formally  agreed  on  in  Con- 
vocation by  the  clergy  of  both 


RICHARD   HOOKER.  11 

tical  object  of  stilling  or  mitigating  controversy, 
far  from  claiming  an  exhaustive  completeness,  far 
from  anticipating  the  character  of  permanence,  which 
subsequent  circumstances  have  given  them,  and  for 
which  they  have  proved  their  extraordinary  fitness. 

So  (I  repeat)  the  new  condition  of  things  in  the 
Church  of  England  had  grown  up  gradually  and 
freely  ;  and,  even  where  it  defined  itself,  had  shrunk, 
as  far  as  might  be,  from  the  task  of  elaborating  an 
ideal  Church  constitution  or  a  comjDlete  theological 
system.  But  it  was  now  confronted  on  either  hand 
by  systems  of  an  altogether  different  type. 

From  the  Koman  Catholic  system — compacted 
every  day  into  a  more  rigid  and  impregnable  hard- 
ness by  the  growth  of  the  Jesuit  ascendancy — it  was 
definitely  cut  off,  by  the  determinate  hostility  into 
which,  by  degrees  and  after  some  vacillations,  the 
Papal  policy  settled  down.  Towards  Kome,  there- 
fore, there  was  as  yet  little  variation  from  the 
defiant  attitude  assumed  by  Jewel  at  Paul's  Cross.* 


provinces    in     1562,    "  for    the  challenge    are    singularly  cha- 

avoidingof  diversities  of  opinions  racteristic.      It   defies    the   Ko- 

and  the  establishment  of  consent  manists    to    advance   on    fifteen 

touching  true   Religion."      The  crucial  points  named,  "  any  one 

alterations    which     transformed  sufficient  sentence  out  of  any  old 

the  former  into  the  latter  {e.g.  Catholic  doctor  or  father,  or  out 

the  insertion  of  Art.  V.)  were  of  any  old  General  Council — or 
evidently  made  with  some  view  |  out  of  the   Holy   Scriptures  of 

to   symmetry  and  permanence.  God — or  any  one  example  of  the 

But  the  general  character  of  the  primitive  Church."     To  the  fif- 

old  still  remained.  teen  points  here  named,  twelve 

*  The  terms  of  this  celebrated  others  were  subsequently  added. 


12  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

In  fact,  the  haughty  excommunication  of  Kome  was 
then  met  by  an  equally  intolerant  rejoinder.  Hooker 
had  (it  should  be  remembered)  formally  to  defend 
himself  for  asserting  that  Roman  Catholics  still  held 
the  foundation  ;  that  their  Church,  though  corrupt, 
was  a  true  Church ;  and  that  individal  members  of 
it  could  claim  a  place  in  God's  covenanted  mercy.* 
On  this  side  there  was  as  yet  little  call  for  any 
change  of  theological  position.  The  champions  of 
the  Reformation  still  contented  themselves  with 
the  old  threefold  protest — intellectual  against  the 
denial  of  all  private  judgment — national  against 
the  despotism  of  a  foreign  usurpation — religious 
against  the  corruptions,  adding  to,  or  taking  from, 
the  true  Scriptural  standard. 

There  was  not  as  yet  any  danger  of  a  Romanist 
reaction,  and  the  chief  attention  of  the  Anglican 
theologians  was  directed  to  a  different  quarter. 


*  See  the  attack  of  Travers  j  of  Eome  .  .  .  denies  not  the 
(in  his  "  Supplication  to  the  j  foundation  directly  but  only  by 
Council")  on  Hooker's  "  Sermons  consequent;  and  therefore  may 
on  Justification."  The  chief  be  saved."  We  note  that  even 
points  of  exception  were  the  the  Archbishop  did  not  accept 
statements  (a)  that  "  the  Church  Hooker's  views  unreservedly,  but 
of  Kome  is  a  true  Church  of  ;  (to  use  Izaak  Walton's  words) 
Christ  .  .  .  though  not  a  pure  ;  "discreetly  and  warily  did  cor- 
or  perfect  Church ;  "  (h)  that  rect  and  moderate  between  them 
*'  They  which  are  of  the  Church  both."  Travers'  Supplication  and 
of  Rome  may  be  saved  by  such  a  Hooker's  Answer  are  given  in 
faith  as  they  have  in  Christ  and  Keble's  '  Hooker,'  vol.  iii.  pp. 
a  general  repentance  of  their  548-596. 
sins; "'  and (c)  that  "The  Church  | 


EICHAED   HOOKER.  13 

(h.)  For,  on  the  other  hand,  within  the  Church  of 
England  itself,  the  position  now  assumed  was  ques- 
tioned in  the  name  of  a  stern  and  thorough  logical 
system,  demanding  an  absolute  clearance  of  the 
ancient  ground,  that  upon  it  the  polity  in  which  it 
delighted  miglit  be  reared  in  all  its  symmetrical 
perfection. 

It  must  never  be  forgotten  that  what  we  commonly 
call  the  ''  Puritan  movement,"  including,  as  it  did, 
very  much  of  the  political  power  and  religious 
earnestness  of  the  land,  was,  before  all  and  after  all 
else,  Calvinistic. 

It  w^as,  indeed,  what  men  ordinarily  term 
"  Puritan  "  in  respect  of  Kitual.  Thus  it  had  a  pas- 
sion for  "simplicity,"  stripping  off  all  ceremonial, 
partly  from  a  horror  of  all  that  seemed  to  be  in  the 
slightest  degree  akin  to  the  ritual  of  Kome  ;  partly 
from  an  antipathy  to  all  appeal  to  the  imagination, 
which  it  called  foolery,  and  to  all  high  sacramental 
doctrine,  which  it  branded  as  superstition.  It  had  a 
passion  for  individual  freedom  in  worship,  chafing 
under  all  forms,  as  necessarily  fettering  and  chilling 
the  spirit.  Now  these  Ritual  questions  were  very 
practical,  refusing  to  be  ignored  or  postponed  in  an 
age  which  allowed  little  to  individual  liberty.  They 
pressed  for  decision.  But  all  Ilitual  questions  in 
themselves  are  but  questions  of  degree.  They  can 
never  be  matters  of  life  and  death,  unless  some 
deeper  questions  underlie  them. 


14  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

There  can  be,  agaiu,  no  doubt  that  this  same  party 
were  Presbyterians  as  to  Church  government.  They 
held  that  a  quasi-republican  government  —  stern 
enough  in  tone,  and  rigid  even  to  hardness  in  adminis- 
tration— of  mixed  clerical  and  lay  elders,  was  the  dis- 
tinctly Scriptural  polity  of  the  Church.  In  some 
cases  they  went  further  still,  towards  Congrega- 
tionalism or  '*  Independency,"  asserting  for  each  con- 
gregation so  administered  the  right  of  almost  abso- 
lute self-government.*  In  any  case.  Episcopacy  was 
odious  to  them,  as  an  usurpation  from  within ;  civil 
authority  was  to  them,  almost  as  much  as  to  Hilde- 
brand  himself,  a  tyranny  from  without — to  be  jealously 
watched,  and,  on  the  first  sign  of  intermeddling 
with  sacred  things,  resolutely  defied.  But,  even 
here,  although  this  aspect  of  their  principles  brought 
them  into  the  most  frequent  practical  conflict  with 
the  powers  of  Church  and  State,  the  true  secret  of 
antagonism  is  not  yet  found.  A  moderate  Epi- 
scopacy (of  the  type  suggested  by  Ussher)  would 
have  satisfied  many. 

It  was  their  Calvinistic  system  of  doctrine,  which 
challenged  the  whole  principle  of  the  Church  of 
England,  as  established  still  on  the  ancient  basis. 
Perhaps  at  no  time  in  Church  history — certainly  at 
no  time  since  the  days  of  St.  Augustine — had  any 
single  mind  so  extensive  and  despotic  a  sway,  as  the 


The  Browniftts,  the  first  Indepeudents,  aj^peared  in  1580. 


RICHARD   HOOKER.  15 

keen,  intrepid,  logical,  comprehensive  mind  of  the 
great  French  llelbrmer.  His  very  opponents  spoke 
of  him  with  bated  breath.*  With  his  Bible  in  his 
hand,  known  in  every  line,  and  interpreted  with  a 
force  which  has  made  him  a  prince  among  commen- 
tators— fastening  on  the  mysterious  predestination 
and  election  of  God,  there  shadowed  out,  as  the  key- 
stone of  his  system — he  was  prepared  to  substitute 
for  the  visible  Church  of  baptized  Christians  the 
Church  of  the  elect,  and  to  sweep  away  utterly  all 
of  the  ancient  historic  Christianity,  which  rested 
on  what  seemed  to  him  a  false  basis. 

Here  we  come  to  a  ground  of  fundamental  oppo- 
sition. The  Prayer  Book,  especially,  could  not  pos- 
sibly be  read  under  the  narrow  light  of  his  system 
without  seeming  to  be  full  of  meptiw,  hardly  tolerahiles 
— things  beautiful,  perhaps,  but  absolutely  unsound.t 


*  Hooker  says  of  liim,  Preface  purchased  ;     so    that    the    per- 

to  '  Ecclesiastical  Polity,'  ii,  8.  fectest  divines  were  judged  they 

"  Two  things  there  are  of  prin-  which  were  skilfulle^t  in  Calvin's 

cipal  moment,  which   have  de-  writings.   Hisbooks  were  almost 

servedly    procured    his    honour  the    Cauon    to   judge    doctrine 

throughout  the  world;   the  one  and  discipline  by."     Mr.  Keble 

his  exceeding  pains  in  compo.-ing  quotes  a  MS.  note  of  Hooker  on 
the  '  Institutes  of  Christian  Re-  '<  the  '  Christian  Letter,'  in  which 
ligion ; '  the    other  his   no  less  i  "  the  sense  of  Scripture  which 

industrious    travails    for    expo-  Calvin  alloweth "  is  said  to  be 

sition  of  Holy  Scripture."     He  held  of  more  force  than  if  '•  ten 

adds,    "  Of    what    account    the  thousand  Augustines,   Jeromes, 

Master  of  the  Sentences  was  in  Chrysostomes,     Cyprians,    were 

the  Church  of  Rome,  the   same  brought  forth.'' 

and  more  amongst  the  preachers  f  That  the  fundamental  objec- 

of  reformed  Chui-ches  Calvin  had  tion  to  the  Prayer  Book  lay  in 


16 


MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY 


That  the  very  Articles  (by  sorae  thought  to  incline 
towards  his  school)  were  to  that  school  utterly  un- 
satisfactory, is  shown  by  the  attempt  to  add  to  them 
the  celebrated  Lambeth  Articles — clear,  uncom- 
promising, ruthless,  in  the  enunciation  of  the  most 
terrible  Calvinistic  doctrines.*     Abroad  it  was  now 


the  simple  fact  that  it  starts,  in 
relation  to  the  membership  of 
Christ,  from  Baptism,  not  from 
Election  or  Conversion,  and 
insists  on  regarding  all  baptized 
persons  as  members  of  Christ,  is 
obvious  to  any  attentive  reader 
of  the  Hampton  Court  and  Savoy- 
Conferences.  Other  objections 
might  have  been  met  :  but  this 
could  not  possibly  have  been 
even  entertained,  without  re- 
versal of  fundamental  principle. 
See  in  Hooker's  'Ecclesiastical 
Polity,'  Book  V.  c.  xlix. ,  a  serious 
accusation  urged  against  our 
Prayer  Book  on  the  ground  that 
it  teaches  us  to  pray  that  "  all 
men  may  be  saved  '' ! 

*  To  understand  thoroughly 
the  question  at  issue,  it  is  only 
necessary  to  glance  at  the  Lam- 
beth Articles,  and  to  consider  what 
an  unbearable  yoke  they  would 
have  imposed  on  the  Church,  and 
what  a  fatal  wound  they  would 
have  inflicted  on  Christianity. 
They  are  as  follows  : — "  1.  God 
from  all  eternity  has  predesti- 
nated some  persons  to  life  and 
others  to  death.  2.  The  moving 
or  efficient  cause  of  predestina-  j 


tion  to  life  is  not  foreseen  faith, 
or  perseverance  in  good  works, 
or  any  other  quality,  in  the 
persons  predestinated,  but  the 
sole  will  and  pleasure  of  God. 
3.  The  number  of  the  predesti- 
nated is  predetermined  and  cer- 
tain, and  cannot  be  increased  or 
diminished.  4.  Those  who  are 
not  predestinated  to  salvation 
are  necessarily  condemned  on 
account  of  their  sins.  5.  A  true, 
lively,  and  justifying  faith,  and 
the  sanctifying  influence  of  the 
Spirit  of  God,  is  not  extin- 
guished, neither  does  it  fail,  nor 
does  it  vanish  away  in  tlie  elect, 
either  finally  or  totally.  6.  A 
man  who  is  truly  faithful,  or 
endowed  with  a  justifying  faith, 
has  a  certain  and  full  assurance 
of  the  remission  of  his  sins,  and 
of  his  everlasting  salvation  by 
Christ.  7.  Saving  grace  is  not 
afforded  to  all  men ;  neither 
have  all  men  such  a  communi- 
cation of  Divine  Assistance  that 
they  may  be  saved  if  they  will. 
8.  No  man  can  come  to  Christ, 
unless  it  be  granted  to  him  and 
the  Father  draw  him ;  and  all 
men  are  not  drawn  bv  the  Father 


EICHARD   HOOKER.  17 

on  the  Calvinistic,  not  the  Lutheran  bodies,  that  the 
great  interest  of  the  struggle  with  Eome  turned. 
At  home,  in  the  imminent  danger  which  menaced 
England  both  in  Church  and  State,  there  was  a  loud 
demand  to  substitute  for  what  seemed  an  irregular 
and  inconsistent  fabric,  a  squared  and  compacted  for- 
tress on  the  well-drawn  lines  of  the  great  French 
system-builder.  This  demand  was  uttered  or  enter- 
tained, not  simply  by  theologians  and  divines,  but 
by  leaders  in  the  Houses  of  Parliament,  by  men 
high  in  the  councils  of  the  Crown.*  It  raised 
clearly  a  most  vital  and  practical  question. 

(c)  How  was  the  demand  to  be  met  ?  In  part, 
perhaps,  it  could  be  met  by  the  simple  power  of  that 
sturdy  Conservatism  of  the  old,  which  has  been  the 
secret  of  the  unbroken  continuity  of  our  English 
Constitution.  In  part,  again  (chiefly  through  the 
determination  of  the  Queen  herself),  by  the  strong 
hand  of  the  Law,  the  right  of  which  to  coerce,  both  in 


that  they  may  come  to  Christ.  '  parison  of  them  with  our  XVIIth 
9.  It  is  not  in  the  will  and  Article  is  most  instructive, 
power  of  every  man  to  be  saved."  *  Burghley  employed  Travers 
(See  Fuller's  'Church  History,'  (Hooker's  chief  antagonist  as  do- 
Book  IX.)  The  most  extraor-  mestic  chaplain  and  tutor  to  his 
dinary  circumstance  in  their  children.  Walsingham  founded 
history  is  that  Whitgift,  the  a  Divinity  Lecture  of  anti- 
bitter  opponent  of  the  Puritans,  Eomish  controversy  at  Oxford, 
was  prepared  to  accept  them,  and  made  Reynolds  his  first 
At  the  Hampton  Conrt  Confer-  lecturer.  Leicester's  tendency 
ence  the  spokesman  of  the  to  coquet  with  the  Puritan  party 
Puritans  formally  demanded  is  well  known.  (See  Keble's 
their  acceptance ;  but  this  was  ,  Preface  to  '  Hooker,'  p.  Ivii.) 
peremptorily  refused.    The  com-  j 

[king's  coll.]  C 


18  MASTEKS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY! 

Church  and  State,  was  questioned  by  none,  although 
they  might  greatly  differ  as  to  the  direction  in 
which  coercion  sliould  be  exercised.  But  the  mere 
instinct  of  Conservatism,  and  the  simple  coercion 
of  law,  can  never  adequately  deal  with  any  movement 
which  has  a  reason  to  give  for  itself — least  of  all, 
wdth  those  religious  movements  which  stir  society  to 
its  very  depths.  So  men  began  to  scan  the  Anglican 
system,  as  by  law  established ;  to  consider  what 
were  the  great  principles  involved  in  its  growth  and 
giving  it  vitality  ;  to  seek  for  an  answer  to  the 
challenges  so  boldly  advanced,  which  might  stand 
the  test  of  examination  on  its  own  merits.  The 
English  divines  rose  to  the  emergency.  Other 
labourers  there  were  in  this  field.  But  the  memory 
of  all  has  paled  before  the  fame  of  Hooker.  In 
his  '  Laws  of  the  Ecclesiastical  Polity,'  we  trace  the 
ideal  embodied  in  the  Elizabethan  settlement ;  in 
it,  accordingly,  we  find  the  first  great  systematic 
development  of  Anglican  theology — involving  (I 
believe)  principles  which,  in  all  its  future  develop- 
ments, have  never  been  wholly  lost. 

It  was  still  characteristic  of  the  EngMi  mind, 
that  this  first  great  work  was  not  an  abstract  treatise 
on  Christian  truth  —a  body  of  "  Institutes  of  the 
Christian  religion."  It  was  an  examination  of  the 
'  Ecclesiastical  Polity ' ;  it  dealt  with  Christianity,  as 
concrete  in  individual  and  corporate  Christian  life. 
But  Hooker,  like  most  creat  thinkers,  well  knew  that 


RICHARD  HOOKER. 


19 


all  society,  and  especially  the  spiritual  society  Avbicli 
we  call  the  Church,  is  based  on  certain  laws,  ex- 
pressive of  the  Creative  Will  in  the  physical  and 
moral  constitution  of  men ;  and  that  these  laws  are 
manifestations,  however  veiled  and  imperfect,  of  the 
nature  of  God  Himself.  Hence,  before  dealing  with 
questions  of  detail,  he  resolved  to  lay  a  foundation 
of  first  principles.  On  this  determination  depends 
all  the  real  and  permanent  value  of  his  great  work. 
He,  like  others,  might  have  been  content  with 
simply  repelling  the  attack'  of  the  enemy,  fighting 
them  on  their  ow^n  ground,  proving  them  wrong,  histo- 
rically or  theoretically,  on  this  or  that  point.  If  he 
had  done  this,  his  work  would  have  been  probably 
easier,  possibly  more  popular  at  the  moment,  but 
certainly  merely  ephemeral.  So  far,  indeed,  as  he  is 
a  mere  polemic,  though  among  polemics  he  stands 
singularly  high  for  gravity,  dignity,  and  fairness,*  he 
is  not  free  from  mere  argumejita  ad  Jiomijiem,  and  from 
the  sophistries  of  special  pleading,  f     But,  happily, 


*  Mr.  Keble  says  in  his  Pre- 
face, "  There  is  not  (us  the  editor 
believes  after  minute  examina- 
tion) a  single  instance  of  unfair 
citation  "  of  the  words  of  oppo- 
nents. Perhaps  this  is  too  un- 
reserved (see,  for  example,  the 
citation  of  CartwriL^ht  in  Book  V. 
c.lxi.  4);  but  in  general  the  state- 
ment is  un(^uestionably  true. 

t  Take  (for  example)  his  apo- 
logy (Book  Y.  c.  xliii )  for  the  ab- 


sence of  Special  Thanksgivings,, 
to  correspond  to  the  Prayers  for 
special  blessings  or  for  deliver- 
ance from  special  evils.  TliS 
defect  itself  was  rightly  removed 
at  a  subsequent  revision.  Or 
again,  his  apology  for  some 
manifest  defects  in  our  transla- 
tion of  the  Bible,  which  it  would 
have  been  far  better  to  acknow- 
ledge as  spots  on  the  sun  (Book 
V.  c.  xix.) 

c  2 


20  MASTERS    IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

he  examined  not  merely  the  errors  of  his  opponents, 
but  the  grounds  of  those  errors,  and  the  truth  which 
they  perverted.*  He  believed  that  the  best  defence 
against  attack  is  the  deepening  and  strengthening 
our  own  position,  and  the  best  remedy  against  the 
rank  weeds  of  falsehood  is  the  cultivation  of  the 
good  seed  of  truth,  so  that  it  may  draw  to  itself 
the  whole  richness  of  the  spiritual  soil,  and  leave 
them  to  pine  away  and  die. 

Now  at  the  basis  of  the  whole  of  his  opponents' 
system  there  lay  a  twofold  fundamental  fallacy,  an 
exaggeration  of  that  great  truth  of  the  *'  sufiSciency 
of  Holy  Scripture  to  salvation,"  which  is  one  of  the 
pivot  Articles  of  the  Church  of  England.  It  was 
held  that  no  law  could  be  of  permanent  obligation 
which  was  not  expressed  in  Holy  Scripture,  and  that 
no  law  which  was  contained  in  any  part  of  Holy 
Scripture  could  fail  to  be  of  permanent  obligation. 
With  the  former  fallacy,  most  of  the  characteristic 
tenets  of  the  party  were  closely  connected.  From  it 
resulted  in  Kitiial  their  hatred  of  all  ceremony  not 
formally  enjoined  in  Holy  Scripture,  and  their  refusal 
to  recognise  any  authority  in  the  Church  4;o  impose 
such  ceremony,  and  thereby  (it  was  conceived)  to 
fetter  the  individual  freedom.  By  it,  undoubtedly^- 
they  justified  their  refusal  to  acknowledge  Episcopal 
authority  in  the  Church,  the  supreme   government 


See  Dean  Church's  Introduction,  already  quoted,  p.  xvi. 


EICHAKD   HOOKER.  21 

of  the  Crown,  and,  ultimately,  the  existence  of  a 
National  Church  as  a  body.  On  this  they  based  the 
Divine  right  of  a  system  depending  on  the  predesti- 
nation and  election  of  God,  revealed  (as  undoubtedly 
they  are  revealed)  in  Holy  Scripture ;  and  defended 
their  refusal  to  recognise  any  historical  develop- 
ment of  the  Church  not  completed  in  the  Apostolic 
age.  To  the  latter  fallacy,  probably  less  serious  in 
itself,  we  must  trace  very  much  of  that  spirit  which, 
as  has  been  well  said,  especially  of  the  Covenanters 
of  Scotland,  made  them  "Christians  of  the  Old 
Testament  rather  than  of  the  New." 

I  do  not  know  that  Hooker  would  have  found 
it  difficult,  without  seriously  examining  these  funda- 
mental principles,  to  have  met  his  antagonists  and 
fought  them,  simply  on  their  own  ground.  It  needs 
little  sagacity  to  see  how  that  work  might  have  been 
done,  and  how,  in  fact,  it  has  been  done,  both  in  parts 
of  Hooker's  writings  and  elsewhere.  But  this  would 
have  been  but  sorry  work  after  all.  It  would  have 
brought  out  no  deep  positive  truth ;  it  would  have 
given  no  rationale  of  the  Anglican  position ;  it  would 
have  had  no  lesson  of  inspiring  example  to  ourselves. 

Hooker  happily  ventured  on  a  bolder  and  a  more 
comprehensive  task.  He  knew*  that  his  argument 
would  seem  '•  to  a  number,  perhaps  tedious,  perhaps 
obscure,  dark,  and  intricate."     To  search  into  the 


*  See  Book  I.  c.  i.  sects.  2  and  3. 


22  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

foundation  of  "  the  stateliness  of  houses,"  and  the 
root  of  "  the  goodliness  of  trees,"  is  "  a  labour  more 
necessary  than  pleasant,  both  to  them  which  undertake 
it  and  to  the  lookers  on."  But  it  must  be  done. 
"  The  laws  of  the  Church  were  called  in  question." 
The  challenge  could  not  be  met  except  by  "  conside- 
ration of  law  in  general,  and  of  that  law  which 
giveth  life  to  the  rest,  namely,  the  law  by  which  the 
Eternal  Himself  doth  work." 

III.  Accordingly  bis  great  work  falls  into  three 
chief  sections.  In  the  first  book  there  is  laid  a 
foundation  of  first  principles,  to  which  the  second 
and  third  books  are  polemic  corollaries.  In  the 
fourth  and  fifth  books  we  have  the  detailed  defence 
of  Church  Discipline  and  Kitual,  involving  also 
defence  of  much  Church  doctrine,  as  implied  therein. 
In  the  last  three  books  is  contained  the  defence  of 
its  government  and  of  its  relation  to  the  State.  To 
judge  of  Hooker's  theology  we  must  consider  those 
three  sections  in  order. 

(A.)  In  the  first  book  Hooker  strikes  an  all- 
important  keynote,  which  Anglican  theology  has 
never  at  any  time  wholly  lost.  He  lays  down  as  his 
fundamental  principle  the  Unity  of  all  Law,  as  the 
expression  of  One  supreme  Will,  which  is  but  another 
method  of  declaring  the  unity  and  final  correlation 
of  all  branches  of  truth.  From  this  follows,  to  all 
who  believe  in  a  Eevelation,  another  principle  of 
transcendent  importance,  the  harmony — not  the  dis- 


RICHARD   HOOKER. 


23 


cord,  not  the  mere  unison — of  the  Natural  with  the 
Supernatural,  both  in  truth  and  in  grace.  In  virtue 
of  both  these  principles,  theology  asserts  its  relation 
to  all  other  forms  of  science,  as  Mater  7ion  noverca 
scientiarum — emphasising  its  own  truths,  without 
denying  others  which  belong  not  to  its  sphere,  and 
content  to  wait  patiently,  not  often  in  vain,  whenever 
their  reconcilement  with  the  revelation  on  which  it 
rests  seems  to  linger. 

No  reader  of  Hooker's  noble  first  book  will  forget 
the  magnificent  comprehensiveness  of  his  treatment. 
He  glances  (in  chap,  ii.)  first  at  that  "First  Law 
Eternal " — "  the  law  which  God  has  set  down  with 
Himself" — in  the  conception  of  which  are  involved 
the  belief  in  the  essential  righteousness  of  His 
Almighty  will,  and  the  self-limitation  (if  we  may  so 
speak)  of  that  will  for  the  sake  of  the  fellow-working 
of  His  creatures.*  Then,  starting  from  this  profound 
conception,  he  surveys  as  a  whole  the  "  Second  Law 
Eternal,  which  God  has  set  to  His  creatures."  Like 
one  who,  on  a  mountain  height,  gazes  alternately  on 
the  great  plain  of  earth  and  the  greater  vault  of 
heaven,  he  takes  his  stand  on  the  level  of  humanity ; 
and  thence,  first  turns  his  eyes  downwards  to  the 
physical  world,  to  which  man  is  bound  by  his  bodily 


*  "  They  err,  therefore,  who 
think  that  of  the  will  of  God  to 
do  this  or  that  there  is  no  reason 
besides  His  will."    "  His  wisdom 


hath  stinted  the  effects  of  His 
power  in  such  sort  that  it  doth 
not  work  infinitely." 


24  MASTEKS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

nature,  and  sees  the  law  of  God  in  the  regularity  of 
physical  necessity,  and  the  rudimentary  developments 
of  a  higher  powei  in  animal  instinct ;  and  next  turns 
his  eyes  upwards  to  the  throne  of  God,  and  by  the 
flashes  of  revelation  contemplates  in  the  "Law  of 
Angels "  the  law  of  the  higher  spiritual  nature,  to 
which  one  day  we  shall  be  like.  Then — with  the 
direct  light  of  heaven  from  above,  and  its  reflections 
from  below,  playing  (so  to  speak)  on  the  intermediate 
nature  of  man — he  sees  God's  law  revealing  itself, 
first  in  the  "  natural  law "  of  the  individual  spirit 
and  of  collective  humanity ;  then  in  the  supernatural 
law  of  His  Kevelation,  alike  to  the  individual  soul  and 
to  the  whole  body  of  the  Church.*  He  holds  that 
the  sufiiciency  of  the  supernatural  light  takes  for 
granted  the  natural,  passes  beyond  it,  but  never 
obscures  or  contradicts  it.  Wherever  there  is  light, 
it  is  the  light  of  God,  and  to  the  believer  in  God  it  is 
sacred.     With  what  freslmess  of  interest  he  glances 


*  His  scheme  may  be  exhibited  thus  : — 
The  Second  Law  Eternal. 


The  Law  Physical. 
I 

Of  Necessity.    Of  Instinct. 

The  Law  of  Humanity. 


The  Law  of  Angels 

(In  tuition  and 

Love). 


XaturaL  SupematuraL 

I  I 


Individual  Corporate  Individual  Corporate 

(Law  of  Conscience).     (Human  Law).        (Law  of  '•  Private        (Law  of  Church). 

Judgment "). 


KTCHAKD  HOOKER.  25 

at  the  manifestations  of  law  and  design  in  Nature  !* 
With  what  boldness  of  delight  in  man's  freedom — 
strange  under  the  exuberant  loyalty,  often  degene- 
rating into  servility,  of  the  Tudor  period — he  traces 
out  the  foundations  of  human  society  and  human 
law !  t  How  earnestly  he  searches  into  man's  own 
nature — the  method  of  human  knowledge,  the  sacred- 
ness  of  conscience,  the  power  of  love,  the  freedom 
of  will! t 

Hence  he  sees  that,  as  in  all  other  knowledge, 
so  in  the  knowledge  of  God,  the  actual  process  of 
learning  is  a  complex  process.  It  has  its  individual 
side  of  "  private  judgment,"  in  which  we  must 
seek  it,  through  our  own  reason  and  conscience 
under  the  guidance  of  the  Spirit  of  God,  whether 
we  survey  the  law  natural  written  on  the  heart,  or 
the   law   supernatural   written   in   Holy   Scripture. 


*  See  chap.  III.  sect.  4,  where  !  express  commission  immediately 
he  discusses  the  theories  of  indi-  and  personally,  received  from 
vidual  design  in  each  creature,  God,  or  by  authority  derived  at 
and  of  "  exemplary  draughts  and  the  first  from  their  consent  upon 
patterns  "  of  classes — the  "arche-  \  whose  persons  they  impose  laws, 
typal  forms "  of  modern  theory.    I  it  is  no  better   than  mere  ty- 

t  See  the  celebrated  chapter  '■  ranny."  Whatever  we  may  think 
(ex.);  iu  which  he  distinctly  of  the  historical  authority  for 
anticipates  "  the  social  com-  these  statements,  so  singularly 
pact ; "  holds  that  "  there  is  no  j  anticipating  the  tenets  of  Locke, 
impossibility  iu  nature  consi-  |  we  cannot  but  be  struck  by  their 
dered  by  itself,  but  that  men  strong  contrast  with  the  theories 
might  have  lived  without  any  afterwards  developed  in  the 
public  regiment ; "  and  con-  ;  school  of  Laud, 
eludes  that  "for  any  prince  or  %  See  chaps,  v.-viii.,  where 
potentate  to  exercise  authority  againthe  well-known  ^it^wZa  rasa 
of  himself,   and  not   either  by    of  the  system  of  Locke  is  found. 


26 


MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 


It  has  its  social  side,  in  which  we  are  led  by 
the  authority  of  mankind,  whether  in  the  secular 
or  the  spiritual  society — in  the  one  claiming  to 
declare  by  statute  the  rights  of  natural  law,  in 
the  other,  to  enforce  by  authorised  interpretation 
the  truth  of  Holy  Scripture.  On  tlie  balance  of  the 
two  elements — the  one  securing  individuality,  and 
the  other  unity — the  well-being  both  of  the  natural 
and  the  supernatural  life  in  man  depends.  Hard 
it  may  be  to  maintain  the  balance;  but  it  must 
be  maintained.  So  again,  the  two  laws  themselves 
imply,  or  presuppose  each  other.  The  law  super- 
natural both  reveals  what  is  beyond  reason,  and 
also  sets  its  divine  seal  on  many  truths  discovered  by 
reason,  and  oh  many  duties  of  which  conscience  bears 
witness.  But  the  law  natural  is  not  contradicted; 
it  is  not  even  superseded  by  the  higher  law  super- 
natural. There  are  points  in  which  it  is  still  left  to 
speak,  and  to  speak  with  an  undiminished  authority.* 


*  See  his  general  conclusion, 
c.  xiv.  sect  5.  "  There  is  in  Scrip- 
ture therefore  no  defect,  but  that 
any  man,  what  place  or  calling 
soever  he  hold  in  the  Church  of 
God,  may  have  thereby  the  light 
of  his  natural  understanding  so 
perfected,  that  the  one  being 
relieved  by  the  other,  there  can 
want  no  part  of  needful  instruc- 
tion unto  any  good  work  which 
God  himself  requireth,  be  it 
natural  or  supernatural,  belong- 


ing simply  unto  men  as  men,  or 
unto  men  as  they  are  united  in 
whatsoever  kind  of  society.  It 
sufficeth  therefore  that  Nature 
and  Scripture  do  serve  in  such 
full  sort,  that  they  both  jointly, 
and  not  severally  either  of  them, 
be  so  complete,  that  unto  ever- 
lasting felicity  we  need  not  the 
knowledge  of  any  thing  more, 
than  these  two  may  easily  fur- 
nish our  minds  with  on  all 
sides." 


KICHARD   HOOKER. 


27 


It  is  not  true,  therefore  (he  concludes),  that  no  law 
can  be  of  permanent  obligation,  even  in  the  things 
of  God,  which  is  not  written  in  the  pages  of  His 
Word. 

So  Hooker  deals  with  the  first  principle  of  his  an- 
tagonists. So  in  different  degrees  all  Anglican  the- 
ology has  since  dealt  with  the  principle  of  what  has 
been  called  "  Bibliolatry," — exaggerating,  and  by 
exaggeration  ultimately  tending  to  overthrow,  the 
supreme  authority  of  lloly  Scripture,  as  speaking  to 
the  individual  soul.*  Far  less  easy  and  simple,  no 
doubt,  is  this  complex  exhibition  of  the  Divine  law, 
in  which  the  individual  and  the  social,  the  natural 
and  the  supernatural,  have  to  be  carefully  studied, 
and  subtly  harmonized  with  each  other,  than  the 
single  appeal,  perhaps  to  an  infallible  inward  light, 
perhaps  to  an  infallible  society  or  person,  perhaps 
to  the  i^sissima  verba  of  Holy  Writ.  Those  who 
make  such  appeals  taunt  us  with  compromise,  in- 
consistency, ambiguity  of  utterance,  if  we  question 
them.  But  to  the  thoughtful  mind  the  very  absence 
of  a  bare,  naked  simplicity  is  a  prima  facie  evidence 
of  truth,  because  it  is  accordant  with  our  own  com- 
plex nature,  with  all  the  imperfections  and  apparent 


*  See  Book  II.  c.  viii.  7.  "  As 
incredible  praises  given  to  men 
do  often  abate  and  impair  the 
credit  of  their  deserved  com- 
mendation ;  so  we  must  likewise 
take   great  heed,  lest  by  attri- 


buting to  Scripture  more  than 
it  can  have,  the  incredibility  of 
that  do  cause  even  those  things 
which  indeed  it  hath  abundantly 
to  be  less  reverently  esteemed." 


28  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

contradictions  of  human  life.  Never,  perhaps,  more 
than  now,  is  the  question  of  this  harmony  of  the 
individual  and  the  social,  of  the  natural  and  the 
supernatural,  forced  upon  us  in  every  field  of 
thought.  In  Hooker — more  (I  think)  than  in 
many  great  theologians  who  succeeded  him — we 
find,  under  some  archaism  of  form,  the  enun- 
ciation of  the  true  principles,  which  must  always 
guide  the  believer ;  whenever,  with  the  beacon- 
light  of  the  revelation  of  Christ  before  his  eyes, 
he  sees  new  cross-lights  breaking  in  on  every 
side — lights  which,  if  they  be  true,  he  will  neither 
quench  nor  ignore  —  lights  of  which,  if  they 
be  ever  so  true,  yet  none  is  sufficient  to  be  his 
guide. 

It  is  in  the  same  large  and  thoughtful  spirit  that 
Hooker  examines  the  other  question  forced  upon  him, 
of  the  permanence  and  immutability  of  this  or  that 
law.  Very  tempting,  again,  tlie  rough  and  ready 
method,  which  cries  out  "  To  the  law  and  the  testi- 
mony !  "  "  It  is  written  in  Holy  Scripture,  it  must 
abide  for  ever."  Very  tempting,  but  utterly  delu- 
sive. There  is  but  one  way  of  determining  whether  a 
law,  however  spoken,  or  a  revelation,  however  given 
to  man,  is  unchangeable — by  determining  whether 
it  belongs  to  man  as  man,  in  the  nature  which  in 
essence  is  unchangeable,  and  in  the  relations  which 
are  primary  and  enduring,  or  whether  it  touches 
only  circumstances,  customs,  institutions,   forms   of 


EICHARD   HOOKER. 


29 


education,  which  have  passed  away.*  Hard,  no 
doubt,  this  to  determine.  It  needs  careful  study ; 
it  is  open  to  endless  controversy ;  it  is  liable  to 
ambiguity  or  error.  It  is  hard ;  but  all  things 
worth  having  are  hard  in  this  world.  The  time  of 
intuition  is  not  yet. 

On  us,  no  doubt,  far  more  than  even  on  Hooker,  lies 
this  hard  task — to  distinguish  between  the  transitory 
and  the  permanent  in  Holy  Scripture,  to  mark  the 
progressiveness  of  God's  revelation  in  its  actual 
historical  order,  and  not  to  confuse  the  grey  of  its 


*  Hooker  expresses  this  truth 
with  singular  clearness  and 
force  in  c.  xv.  sect.  3.  "  Where- 
fore to  end  with  a  general  rule 
concerning  all  the  laws  which 
God  hath  tied  men  unto :  those 
laws  divine  that  belong,  whe- 
ther naturally  or  supernaturally, 
either  to  men  as  men,  or  to  men 
as  they  live  in  politic  society,  or 
to  men  as  they  are  of  that  politic 
society  which  is  the  Church, 
without  any  further  respect  had 
unto  any  such  variable  accident 
as  the  state  of  men  and  of  socie- 
ties of  men  and  of  the  Church 
itself  in  this  world  is  subject 
unto;  all  laws  that  so  belong 
unto  men,  they  belong  for  ever, 
yea  although  they  be  Positive 
Laws,  unless  being  positive  God 
himself  which  made  them  alter 
them.  The  reason  is,  because 
the  subject  or  matter  of  laws  in 
general  is  thus  far  forth  con- 


stant :  which  matter  is  that  for 
the  ordering  whereof  laws  were 
instituted,  and  being  instituted 
are  not  changeable  without 
cause ;  neither  can  they  have 
cause  of  change,  when  that 
which  gave  them  their  first  in- 
stitution remaineth  for  ever  one 
and  the  same.  On  the  other 
side,  laws  that  were  made  for 
men  or  societies  or  churches,  in 
regard  of  their  being  such  as 
they  do  not  always  continue, 
but  may  perliaps  be  clean  other- 
wise a  while  after,  and  so  may 
require  to  be  otherwise  ordered 
than  before;  the  laws  of  God 
himself  which  are  of  this  natui'e, 
no  man  endued  with  conamon 
sense  will  ever  deny  to  be  of  a 
different  constitution  from  the 
former,  in  respect  of  the  one's 
constancy  and  the  mutability  of 
the  other.". 


30 


MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 


early  dawn  with  the  full  noonday — to  distinguish  in 
Church  constitution  between  that  which  is  essential 
and  therefore  permanent,  and  that  which  is  second- 
ary and  therefore  changeable.  How  constantly  are 
we  tempted  to  cut  the  Gordian  knot  by  some  sharp, 
narrow  decision  on  this  side  or  on  that !  Yet  to  yield 
to  that  temptation  is  simply  fatal — purchasing  victory 
at  the  price  of  truth,  and  gaining  rest  as  by  some 
spiritual  suicide.  When  we  pass  from  the  pages  of 
some  who  have  yielded  to  it  to  the  writings  of  our 
first  great  English  theologian,  we  hail  gladly  the 
work  of  a  strong  pioneer  in  the  steep  and  rugged 
way  of  truth ;  and  we  trust  that  the  later  ages  of 
our  theology  may  never  belie  the  noble  promise 
of  its  early  morning.* 


*  We  trace  precisely  the  same 
philosophical  and  candid  spirit 
in  Hookers  method  of  dealing 
with  other  questions  subsidiary 
to  the  main  argument.  Thus 
(a)  we  note  his  careful  distinc- 
tion between  a  priori  and  a 
posleriori  argument  as  to  the 
essential  superiority  of  a  written 
Eevelation  over  an  unwritten 
Tradition  (c.  xiii.  sect.  2).  "  Now, 
although  we  do  not  deny  it  to 
be  a  matter  merely  accidental 
unto  the  law  of  God  to  be 
written:  although  writing  be 
not  tliat  which  added  authority 
and  strength  thereunto ;  finally, 
though  his  laws  do  require  at 
our  hands  the  same  obedience 


howsoever  they  be  delivered  ; 
his  providence  notwithstanding 
which  hath  made  principal 
choice  of  this  way  to  deliver 
them,  who  seeth  not  what  cause 
we  have  to  admire  and  magnify?" 
(b)  We  observe,  again,  his  wise 
and  thoughtful  view  of  tradition 
(c.  xiv.  sect.  5).  "That  which  is 
of  God,  and  may  be  evidently 
proved  to  be  so,  we  deny  not  but 
it  hath  in  his  kind,  although 
unwritten,  yet  the  self- same 
force  and  authority  with  the 
written  laws  of  God.  It  is  by 
ours  acknowledged,  '  that  the 
Apostles  did  in  every  church 
institute  and  ordain  some  rites 
and    customs    serving    for    the 


KTCHARD  HOOKER. 


31 


So  it  is  that  he  lays  the  foundation.  With  his 
foot  firmly  planted  thereon,  it  is  not  hard  for  him  to 
strike  in  the  next  two  books  decisive  blows  against 
the  two  fundamental  positions  of  his  antagonists — 


seemliness  of  clmrcli-regiment, 
which  rites  and  customs  they 
have  not  committed  unto  writ- 
ing.' Those  rites  and  customs 
bei!ig  known  to  be  apostolical, 
and  liaving  the  nature  of  things 
changeable,  were  no  less  to  be 
accounted  of  in  the  Church  than 
other  things  of  the  like  degree  ; 
that  is  to  say,  capable  in  like 
sort  of  alteration,  although  set 
down  in  the  Apostles'  writings. 
For  both  being  known  to  be 
apostolical,  it  is  not  the  manner 
of  delivering  them  unto  the 
Church,  but  the  author  from 
whom  they  proceed,  which  doth 
give  them  their  force  and  credit." 
(c)  We  note,  once  more  (in 
c.  xiii.  3),  his  admii-able  de- 
scription of  the  fulness  of  Holy 
Scripture,  and  the  sense  in 
which  all  its  parts  are  •'  neces- 
sary." "  By  Scripture  it  hath  in 
the  wisdom  of  God  seemed  meet 
to  deliver  unto  the  world  much 
but  personally  expedient  to  be 
practised  of  certain  men;  many 
deep  and  profound  points  of 
doctrine,  as  being  tlie  main  ori- 
ginal ground  whereupon  the 
precepts  of  duty  depend ;  many 
prophecies,  the  clear  perform- 
ance whereof  might  confirm  the 
world  in  belief  of  things  uoseen : 


many  histories  to  serve  as  look- 
ing-glasses to  behold  the  mercy, 
the  truth,  the  righteousness  of 
God  towards  all  that  faithfully 
serve,  obey,  and  honour  him ; 
yea  many  entire  meditations  of 
piety,  to  be  as  patterns  and  pre- 
cedents in  cases  of  like  nature ; 
many  things  needful  for  expli- 
cation, many  for  application 
unto  particular  occasions,  such 
as  the  providence  of  God  from 
time  to  time  hath  taken  to  have 
the  several  books  of  His  holy 
ordinance  written.  Be  it  then 
that  togetiier  with  the  principal 
necessary  laws  of  God  there  are 
sundry  other  things  written, 
whereof  we  might  haply  be 
ignorant  and  yet  be  saved  :  what  ? 
shall  we  hereupon  think  them 
needless  ?  shall  we  esteem  them 
as  riotous  branches  wherewith 
we  sometimes  behold  most  plea- 
sant vines  overgrown?  Surely 
no  more  than  we  judge  our  hands 
or  our  eyes  supertiuoas,  or  what 
part  soever,  which  if  our  bodies 
did  want,  we  might  notwith- 
standing any  such  defect  retain 
still  the  complete  being  of  men." 
Each  passage,  while  it,  of 
cour^ie,  bears  the  impress  of  the 
time,  is  written  for  posterity. 


32 


MASTEKS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 


the  maxim  that  for  the  individual  Christian  life 
"  Scripture  is  the  only  rule  of  all  things  which  in 
this  life  may  be  done  of  men ; "  *  and  the  maxim 
that,  for  the  corporate  life  of  the  Church,  "there 
must  be  in  Scripture  a  form  of  Church  polity,  the  laws 
of  which  may  not  be  altered."  t  On  each,  indeed, 
he  argues  separately.  He  examines  the  supposed 
claims  of  Holy  Scripture  for  itself.  He  enters  (so 
far  as  the  knowledge  of  the  day  allowed  J)  into  the 
history  and  the  writings  of  the  early  Church.  He 
discusses  the  abstract  reasoning  of  his  opponents. 
He  traverses,  therefore,  the  time-honoured  path  of 
investigation  of  Scripture,  of  Authority,  of  Keason. 
Yet,  after  all,  the  argument  of  the  first  book  is  all- 
sufficient.  It  is  not  by  mere  accident  that  the 
second  and  third  books  are  but  little  read ;  although 
I  think  it  would  be  well  if  the  opening  of  the  third 
book  on  the  nature  of  the  Church  §  were  in  all  cases 
associated  with  the  study  of  the  fifth  book.  But  it 
is  to  my  mind  a  fatal  error  to  dwell  on  any  part 
of  Hooker's  great  work  without  study  of  the  deep 
foundation  laid  in  the  first — -more  valuable  (I  ven- 
ture to  think)  in  itself,  more  important  in  its  effects 


*  See  Book  II. 

t  See  Book  III. 

X  It  will  be  noted,  for  instance, 
how  far  more  copiously  he  quotes 
from  the  Latin  than  from  the 
Greek  Fathers,  and  how  (in  Book 
V.)  he    accepts    unhesitatingly 


the    Athanasian    authorship    of 
the  "  Athanasian  Creed." 

§  I  mean  Book  III.  chap.  1,  on 
the  distinction  between  the 
visible  and  the  invisible  Church, 
and  the  requirements  for  mem- 
bership of  both. 


EICHARD   HOOKER.  33 

on  subsequent  English  theology,  certainly  fuller 
of  living  instruction  to  us,  than  any  part  of  the 
more  apologetic  and  polemic  superstructure  which 
he  has  raised  upon  it. 

(B.)  But  I  pass  to  the  consideration  of  that  super- 
structure itself  in  the  fourtli  and  fifth  books.* 

In  these  books  are  contained  the  defence  of  our 
Church  worship  and  Kitual. 

(a)  The  fourth  book  repels  an  attack  on  the 
ground,  not  of  abstract  demerit,  but  of  a  want  of 
Apostolical  simplicity  t — of  too  great  likeness  to 
the  Church  of  Kome,t — of  unlikeness  to  the  system 
of  foreign  Protestant  Churches  abroad,§ — of  a  de- 
rivation from  the  Judaic  ceremonial  of  the  Old 
Testament  |1 — of  the  retention  of  that  which  had 
been  hopelessly  corrupted  by  idolatry.^ 

Of  these  points  some  have  little  more  than  a  his- 
torical interest.  It  is  simply  curious  to  observe  (for 
example)  the  horror  of  isolation  from  foreign  Pro- 
testant bodies,  proceeding  from  a  party  which  tended 
distinctly  to  Congregationalism  and  even  to  mere 
individualism  in  religion ;  and  the  implied  claim  of 
an  authority  for  Calvin  and  his  system,  which  was 


*  It  is  true  that,  as  the  first  1  worship  against   charge  of  Po- 
four  books  were  first  published,  |  pery — the  other  defending  it  on 


the  fourth  book  might  seem 
more  naturally  connected  with 
the  second  and  third.  But 
examination  shows  it  to  be  rather 
preparatory  to  the  fifth  book — 
the  one   defending  our  Chiu-ch 


its  merits. 

t  See  chap.  ii. 
X  See  chaps,  iii.-x. 
§  See  chap,  xiii. 
II  See  chap.  xi. 
•|f  See  chap.  xii. 


[king's  coll.]  D 


34  MASTEES   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

denied  to  the  Papacy,  and  even  to  Catliolic  usage 
and  law.  But  the  two  charges  on  which  tlie  main 
stress  is  laid,  and  which  are  of  permanent  interest, 
are  the  likeness  to  Eome,  and  the  retention  of  what 
had  been  corrupted  by  her. 

Now  on  these  there  was  a  time — which  I  can  re- 
collect— when  Hooker's  argument  had  for  us  its 
usefulness  and  necessity.  It  was  a  time  when,  in 
common  •  parlance  and  in  common  thought,  men 
had  forgotten  to  distinguish  the  term  '^Eomish" 
from  the  term  "  Catholic  " — when  they  spoke  as  if 
the  necessarily  negative  word  *'  Protestant "  was  a 
full  positive  description  of  faith — when  they  under- 
stood but  little  the  true  principle  of  our  English 
Beformation — when  they  had  studied  but  imper- 
fectly the  origin,  the  growth,  the  distinguishing 
characteristics,  of  our  Prayer  Book — when  any  sup- 
posed likeness  to  Rome,  even  in  points  not  distinc- 
tively Romish,  was  at  all  hazards  denounced  and 
condemned. 

But  that  time  has  gone  by,  not  for  one  school 
only,  but  in  different  degrees  for  all  schools  in  the 
Church.  To  argue  against  an  almost  obsolete  line 
of  thought  is  simply  to  slay  the  slain. 

Now,  perhaps,  it  is  rather  in  the  caution  and 
moderation  of  Hooker's  argument  that  we  may  find 
our  needful  lesson.  For  unquestionably  there  is  a 
rash  tendency  to  copy  what  is  characteristically 
Romish — forgetful  that  (thanks  to  the  iron  symmetry 


EICHAKD    HOOKER.  35 

of  the  Fiomisli  System)  there  is  constantly  involvec], 
even  in  minute  and  beautiful  ceremonial,  \vhat  is 
distinctively  and  avowedly  Eomish  in  doctrine. 
With  that  tendency,  and  in  defence  of  it,  men  are 
fond  of  quoting  with  a  flippant  decisiveness  the 
proverb,  ''Ahusus  non  tollit  usum^'  not  seeing  that — 
while  human  nature  is  what  it  is,  governed  so  largely 
by  the  power  of  even  accidental  association — it  is 
almost  as  great  folly  to  apply  that  proverb  with 
absolute  unreserve,  as  to  fall  into  tlie  opposite  error 
of  denying  it  altogether.  How  can  we  doubt  that, 
as  there  are  ideas,  so  inseparably  connected  with 
ludicrous  associations  that  they  have  lost  their 
intrinsic  solemnity,  so  there  are  rites  so  impregnated 
with  associations  of  falsehood,  that  they  cannot  be 
used  without  endangering  truth  ?  Hooker,  and  our 
great  divines  of  the  more  distinctively  High  Church 
school  which  succeeded  him,  were  far  too  wise  to 
adopt  this  rash  and  shallow  argument.  Living  at  a 
time  when  men  knew  by  recent  painful  experience 
the  corruption  and  the  yoke  of  Eome,  they  treated 
seriously,  with  careful  discrimination,  the  charges 
which  some  would  now  dispose  of  by  an  easy  sneer. 
They  dealt  with  each  case  (as  the  compilers  of  the 
Prayer  Book  did)  on  its  own  merits.  They  retained 
here ;  they  rejected  there.  For  both  maintenance  and 
rejection  they  knew  how  to  give  weighty  reasons. 
Even  here,  therefore,  from  Hooker  and  his  successors 
the  nineteenth  century  may  learn. 

D  2 


36  MASTEES   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

(h)  But,  undoubtedly,  far  more  valuable,  and 
rightly  far  more  carefully  studied,  is  the  defence  in 
the  great  Fifth  book  of  the  worship  of  our  Church 
upon  its  own  merits. 

I  have  neither  time  nor  desire  to  examine  that 
book  in  the  width  of  its  scope — especially  as  on  almost 
every  point  it  is  singularly  instructive  and  sugges- 
tive. In  careful  and  exhaustive  treatment,  it  leads 
its  readers  from  the  consideration  of  the  material 
fabric  of  our  Churches,*  through  the  discussion  of  the 
various  forms  of  teaching  God's  Word  ;t  the  examina- 
tion of  the  principle  of  a  Liturgy,  and  then  of  all 
the  various  parts  and  accessories  of  our  Prayer-Book 
worship  ;J  the  doctrine  of  the  Sacraments  and  their 
forms  of  ministration ;  §  the  principles  of  Fast  and 
Festival ;  ||  the  details  of  our  Occasional  Services ;  IT 
the  three  Orders,  and  even  the  accidents  of  our 
ministry  and  parochial  system.**  No  wonder  that 
from  time  immemorial  it  has  been  studied,  as  the 
best  commentary  on  our  Prayer  Book.  Much  of  its 
merely  polemical  work  is  dead ;  some  little  deserved 
to  die.  But,  underlying  polemics,  there  is  a  mass 
of  what  is  positive— thought  and  learning,  nobleness 
and  spirituality  of  tone — which  will  live  (I  believe) 
as  long  as  the  English  language  itself. 

It  is  rather  to  the  general  character  of  Hooker's 


*  Chaps,  xi.-xvii. 
t  Chaps,  xviii.-sxii. 
+  Chaps,  xxiii.-xlix. 
§  Chaps,  l.-lxviii. 


II  Chaps.  Ixix.-lxxii. 
%  Chaps.  Ixxiii.-lxxv. 
**  Chaps.  Ixxvi.-lxxxi. 


RICHARD   HOOKER.  37 

theological  treatment  of  this  wide  range  of  subjects 
that  I  would  direct  attention. 

The  one  leading  characteristic — to  my  mind 
simply  invaluable — is  the  same  determination  as 
before,  to  escape  from  bewildering  contests  of  detail 
to  the  freer,  healthier  atmosphere  of  general  prin- 
ciples. 

How  characteristic  it  is  that,  before  he  will  begin 
the  discussion  of  that  which  is  as  the  visible  body 
of  the  religious  spirit,  he  arrests  the  attention  of 
all — not  of  theologians  or  scholars  only,  but  of  every 
thinking  man — by  dwelling  on  the  effects  on  human 
society  of  Keligion,  Atheism,  Superstition  :  the  first 
to  inspire  and  ennoble;  the  second  to  deaden  and 
degrade;  the  third  to  distort  and  pervert!*  He 
knew  well — what  shallow  thinkers  are  apt  to  forget — 
that  outward  custom,  ritual,  phraseology  must  in- 
evitably involve  principles ;  and  that  there  are  no 
principles  which  so  powerfully  affect  society  for 
good  or  for  evil,  as  religious  principles.  The  whole 
form,  basis,  tone  of  society  are  changed,  according 
as  religion  or  irreligion  rules,  and  according  as  the 
religion  which  is  dominant  is  false  or  true,  sensuous 
or  spiritual.     Probably  on  all  sides  that  teaching  is 


*  See   chaps,  i.-iii.   Hoolcer's  I  from  toleration,  and  against  this 

toleration  towards  religious  error  "  execrable    crew  "   of    "  forlorn 

is  large,  singular  for  his  time,  creatures "  he  cries  out  for  "  the 

and  hardly  excelled  since.     But  decree  of  Nabuchodonosor. " 
(like  Locke)  he  excludes  atheists 


38 


MASTERS    IN   ENGLISH    THEOLOGY: 


accepted  now.  Christianity  is  honoured  everywhere 
— as  by  enthusiastic  love,  so  by  intense  and  undying 
hatred.  A  glance  at  the  whole  history  of  our  day  will 
tell  us  that  the  indifference,  which  looked  upon  all 
relio'ious  controversies  as  on  "  the  battles  of  kites 
and  crows,"  has  long  passed  away. 

But  he  passes  to  the  discussion  itself,  and  he  will 
not  examine  its  details,  before  he  has  laid  down  his 
great  leading  principles  of  Church  Eitual  and  Order. 

The  first  is  substantially  the  great  principle  of 
Svmbolism.*  Form,  rite,  ceremony  there  must  be  ; 
they  are  as  the  outward  body  of  religion.  The  great 
question  always  mu^st  be,  not  "  Are  the  limbs  of 
that  body  in  themselves  beautiful  ?  "  but,  "  What  is 
the  expression  of  the  face?"  "What  is  the  soul 
that  looks  through  them?"  All  other  questions  are 
questions  of  degree.  They  turn  on  the  proper  function 
of  the  imagination,  and  on  the  characteristics  of  dif- 
ferent ages,  different  races,  different  standards  of 
education.  But  two  questions  are  absolute — "  What 
idea  does  Eitual  symbolize  ?  "  "  Is  this  idea  true  or 
false?"  Both  are  hard  to  answer.  Perhaps  the 
greatest  difficulty  (which  makes  all  decisions  of  doc- 
trine on   c|uestions   of  Eitual  'unsatisfactory)  is  to 


*  See  chap.  vi.  "The  first 
Ihing  is  .  .  .  when  there  ariseth 
apparent  reason  competent  to 
show  their  conveniency  and  fit- 
ness, in  resrard  to  the  use  for 


which  they  should  serve."  "  That 
which  inwardly  each  man  should 
be,  the  Church  outwardly  ought 
to  testify."  "  Signs  must  re- 
semble the  things  they  signify  " 


EICHARD  HOOKER.  39 

answer  the  former  question  clearly.  Who  has  a  right 
(for  example)  to  say  what  the  "  Eastward  position  " 
necessarily  symbolizes?*  But  still  in  days  of  Kitual 
controversy,  petty  as  it  may  seem  in  itself,  it  seems  to 
me  infinitely  important  to  keep  Hooker's  principle  in 
mind.  All  Eitual  symbolizes  something  ;  its  power 
to  steal  on  the  mind  through  the  imagination  is 
great.  It  cannot  be  matter  of  indifterence  or  degree 
whether  we  have  that  which  symbolizes  falsehood,  or 
that  which  symbolizes  truth.  Oar  Church  of  England 
has  obviously  held  this  to  be  the  case,  by  impos- 
ing a  set  form  of  Ritual  and  worship,  which  has  told 
powerfully  on  doctrine  and  spiritual  tone.  Hooker  is 
surely  right  in  thinking  that  its  maintenance  against 
all  unauthorised  infringements,  on  the  right  hand 
and  on  the  left,  is  a  matter  not  of  detail  or  of  mere 
order,  but  of  principle.  \\e  certainly  have  had  the 
lesson  which  he  taught  forced  upon  our  attention 
with  a  greater  clearness  and  gravity  than  even  in 
his  critical  days.  His  teaching  should  still  have 
a  living  meaning  for  us. 

The  second  principle  is  that  which  lay  at  the  very 
root  of  the  composition  of  the  Prayer  Book — that  all 
ritual  and  order,  thus  symbolizing  truth,  should 
never  unnecessarily  depart  from  primitive  custom. 


*  For  example,  the  Eastward  j  Zuinglianism  must  recognise  wor- 
position  (as  use  at  the  Litany  {  ship  in  the  Holy  Communion,  and 
and  the  Creed  shows)  is  often  a  !  might  adopt  the  Eastward  posi- 
positioa  of  worship.    The  barest  I  tion  accordingly. 


40 


MASTEES   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 


and  so  should  carry  with  it  the  authority  of  the 
ancient  undivided  Church.*  Where  the  standard 
of  truth  is,  there  must  the  standard  of  ritual,  as 
symbolizing  truth,  should  be.  This  principle  is 
simply  the  historical  principle,  which  is  brought  out 
more  fully  in  relation  to  Church  government. 

Clearly  in  respect  of  Kitual  it  can  but  apply  to 
the  main  lines  of  principle,  as,  for  example,  in  rela- 
tion to  the  great  Liturgies  of  early  days.  In  lesser 
matters  it  can  hardly  hold,  except  as  a  defence 
against  frivolous  and  wanton  objections.  Certainly 
the  compilers  of  our  Prayer  Book  showed  that  they 
would  have  thought  it  folly  to  apply  it  slavishly  to 
the  details,  which  must  vary  in  different  ages.  But 
in  regard  of  those  main  principles  it  has  an  im- 
portant truth  and  value.  In  Eitual,  more  than  even 
in  great  theological  writings,  can  we  trace  the  actual 
faith  of  the  Primitive  Church.  In  Kitual  we  trace 
with  singular  clearness  the  gradual  accretion  of  the 
peculiarly  Eomish  doctrines,  which  our  Church  has 
rejected.   In  the  distinction,  therefore,  between  what 


*  See  cliap.  vii.  "  Neither  may 
we  in  this  case  lightly  esteem 
what  hath  been  allowed  as  fit  by 
the  judgment  of  antiquity,  and 
by  the  long-continued  practice  of 
the  whole  Church,  from  which 
unnecessarily  to  swerve,  experi- 
ence hath  never  as  yet  found  it 
safe."  It  is  curious  that  Hooker 
has  fallen  into  the  error  of  com- 
paring the  judgment  of  antiquity 


to  the  judgment  of  old  age, 
whereas  in  this  resj^ect  Bacon 
warns  us  that  "  we  are  the  true 
ancients,"  and  that  the  early 
ages  are  the  ages  of  the  world's 
youth.  But  the  error  does  not 
affect  the  argument.  What  has 
stood  the  test  of  centuries  is  now 
really  "  old  "  in  his  sense  of  the 
word. 


EICHAKD   HOOKER.  41 

is  Komish  and  what  is  Catholic,  this  principle  of 
general  accordance  with  primitive  Eitual  must  always 
play  a  very  considerable  part. 

And  his  third  principle  is  one  of  paramount  im- 
portance. It  is  the  plea  that  there  should  be  a 
living  authority  in  our  own  branch  of  the  Church, 
both  to  enact  and  to  dispense,  both  to  lay  down 
order  and  from  time  to  time  to  modify  it.*  Other- 
wise, he  forcibly  urges,  there  cannot  be  any  unity  in 
worship.  For  time  must  bring  some  changes,  and 
these  changes  must  be  sanctioned  by  some  authority. 
If  this  does  not  exist,  or  if  it  cannot  act,  what  can 
be  our  guide  ?  Whether  a  man  listens  to  the  voice  of 
his  own  conscience,  or  w^hat  he  calls  the  "  voice  of 
the  Church,"  as  interpreted  by  himself,  the  result 
must  equally  be  anarchy,  confusion,  disruption.  It  is 
impossible  to  doubt  the  soundness  of  his  principle, 
either  considered  in  the  abstract,  or  illustrated  by 
our  own  experience  of  the  evils  resulting  from  its 
long  abeyance. 

It  is,  indeed,  a  marvel  that  in  using  a  Ritual,  almost 


*  Hooker  divides  this  axiom 
into  two  parts.  In  chap.  viii.  he 
dwells  on  the  former  part,  that 
"  the  Church  being  a  body  that 
dieth  not,  hath  always  power,  as 
occasion  requireth,  no  less  to 
ordain  that  which  never  was, 
than  to  ratify  what  hath  been 
before."  In  chap.  ix.  he  urges 
that  it  may  not  seem  "  hard,  if  in 


cases  of  necessity,  or  for  common 
utility's  sake,  certain  profitable 
ordinances  sometime  be  released, 
rather  than  all  men  be  strictly 
bound  to  the  general  rigour 
thereof."  But  the  two  clearly 
hang  together,  and  may,  for  the 
sake  of  simplicity,  be  considered 
as  one. 


42  MASTERS    IN   ENGLISH    THEOLOGY: 

unmodified  by  authority  for  two  hundred  years,  our 
Church  should  have  felt  so  little  burden.  It  is  fair 
to  argue  from  this  fact  that  great  must  have  been 
the  wisdom  with  w^hich  it  was  framed,  and  large  the 
liberty  and  variety  existent  under  it.  But  still 
neglect  of  right  principle  will  avenge  itself.  A 
Church,  for  its  well-being,  must  have  legislative, 
as  well  as  judicial  and  executive  powers.  If  the 
greatest  of  these — the  legislative  power — lies  vir- 
tually in  abeyance,  its  province  will  be  usurped  by 
the  lower  powers  on  the  one  hand,  or  by  individual 
vagary  of  minister  or  congregation  on  the  other. 
There  cannot  ultimately  be  peace,  or  a  reduction  of 
all  controverted  questions  to  their  proper  dimen- 
sions, unless  Hooker's  principle  be  realized. 

Here,  as  before,  it  is  on  Hooker's  resolution  to  dig 
down  through  superficial  controversy  to  the  solid 
ground  of  first  j^rinciples  that  the  permanent  value 
of  his  great  work  depends.  The  Puritan  controversy 
itself  passed  by.  But  in  the  principles  here  laid 
down  he  struck  a  keynote,  taken  up  again  and 
again  by  Anglican  theology.  Nor  is  it  hard  to  find 
in  them,  mutatis  mutandis,  guidance  for  the  ques- 
tions and  difficulties  of  our  own  times. 

It  would  not  be  difficult  to  trace  in  the  various 
details  of  his  defence  of  Church  order  the  same 
firm  grasp  of  far-reaching  and  permanent  principles. 
But  one  example — the  noblest  of  all — will  suffice. 
We  turn  to  that  celebrated  section  where,  dealing 


EICHARD   HOOKER.  43 

with  tlie  one  most  important  point  of  Church  ordi- 
nance— the  doctrine  and  the   ritual  of  the  Sacra- 
ments— he  bases  the  whole  sacramental  doctrine  on 
the  deep  fundamental  truth  of  the  Incarnation  itself. 
There  we  observe  with  what  masterly  precision  he 
first  sketches  out  the  great  truth  of  "  God  in  Christ," 
and  the  reunion  of  the  two  natures  in  Him,  oXtjOm^, 
TeXea)9,    dSiaipeTco^,   davyxyTco<;,    as    the    conception 
was  slowly  wrought  out  through  inquiry,  controversy, 
heresy,  in  the   ancient  Church.*     We  follow,  with 
the  close  attention  which  it  needs,  the  depth  and 
subtlety  of  thought  with  which  he  works  out,  next, 
the  conception  of  a  real  presence  of  Christ,  in  the 
perfect  harmony  of  His  twofold  nature,  both  in  His 
Church  and  in  His  elect,  to  justify  and  to  sanctify 
the  soul.t  We  see  that  then,  and  not  till  then,  he 
proceeds  to  treat  the  Sacraments,  in  relation  to  the 
general  indwelling  of  Christ,  and  declares  how  "  Sa- 
craments do  serve  to  make  us  partakers  of  Him."  t 
Singularly  instructive  to  the  theologian  is  this  pro- 
found  unity  of  treatment,  connecting  sacramental 
doctrine  with  the  very  foundation  of  our  Christianity. 
Not  less  instructive  to  the  Church  at  large,  in  espe- 
cial reference  to  the  second  great  Sacrament,  is  that 
passage  of  earnest  and  impressive  eloquence,  which 
urines    that,    among    all   who    hold    not   that   bare 


*  See  chaps,  li.-liv.  f  See  cliaps.  Iv.-lvi. 

X  Chaps.  Ivii.-lviii. 


44 


MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 


Zuinglian  theory  which  our  Church  expressly  repu- 
diates, there  are  these  great  fundamental  points  of 
agreement  * — that  it  is  a  real  participation  of  Christ — 
that  it  is  a  real  means  of  the  grace  of  the  Holy 
Ghost — that  in  it  there  is  accordingly  a  justification 
through  Christ's  blood,  and  sanctification  of  the 
soul — that  all  rests  simply  and  solely  on  the  or- 
dinance of  the  Lord  Himself;  and  that — all  this 
being  accepted — we  should  inquire  and  dispute  no 
farther,  but  meet  as  brethren  in  that  Holy  Com- 
munion which  ought  to  be  the  very  bond  of  peace.f 


*  See  chap.  Ixvii.  sect.  2. 

t  See  the  close  of  chap.  Ixvii. 
sect.  12. 

"Let  it  therefore  be  suffi- 
cient for  me,  presenting  myself 
at  the  Lord's  Table,  to  know 
what  there  I  receive  from  him, 
without  searching  or  enquiring 
of  the  manner  how  Christ  per- 
formeth  his  promise ;  let  disputes 
and  questions,  enemies  to  piety, 
abatements  of  true  devotion,  and 
hitherto  in  this  cause  but  over- 
patieutly  heard,  let  them  take 
their  rest ;  let  curious  and  sharp- 
witted  men  beat  their  heads 
about  what  questions  themselves 
will,  the  very  letter  of  the  word 
of  Christ  giveth  plain  security 
that  these  mysteries  do  as  nails 
fasten  us  to  his  very  cross ;  that 
by  them  we  draw  out,  as  touching 
efficacy,  force,  and  virtue,  even 
the  blood  of  his  gored  side ;   in 


the  wounds  of  our  Eedeemer  we 
there  dip  our  tongues;  we  are 
dyed  red  both  within  and  with- 
out ;  our  hunger  is  satisfied,  and 
our  thirst  for  ever  quenched. 
They  are  things  wonderful  which 
he  feeleth,  great  which  he  seeth, 
and  unheard  of  which  he  uttereth, 
whose  soul  is  possessed  of  this 
Paschal  Lamb,  and  made  joyful 
in  the  strength  of  this  new  wine ; 
this  bread  hath  in  it  more  than 
the  substance  which  our  eyes  be- 
hold; this  cup,  hallowed  with 
solemn  benediction,  availeth  to 
the  endless  life  and  welfare  both 
of  soul  and  body,  in  that  it  serveth, 
as  well  for  a  medicine  to  heal  our 
infirmities  and  purge  our  sins,  as 
for  a  sacrifice  of  thanksgiving ; 
with  touching  it  sanctifieth,  it 
enlighteneth  with  belief,  it  truly 
conformeth  us  into  the  image  of 
Jesus  Christ ;  what  these  elements 


EICHARD   HOOKER. 


45 


Yery  notable  to  my  mind  are  certain  negative 
points  of  detail  in  his  treatment.  It  is  surely  notable 
that,  while  stoutly  defending  the  surplice  against 
the  charge  that  it  is  a  "  rag  of  Popery,"  "  a  sacra- 
ment of  idolatry  "  and  the  like,  he  never  dreams  of 
any  other  vestments.*  Notable  that  in  all  his  treat- 
ment, while  there  is  much  of  the  Sacrament,  there  is 
hardly  any  reference  to  Sacrifice,  even  in  the  sense, 
which  subsequent  Anglican  usage  has  sanctioned ; 
and  (in  dealing  hereafter  with  the  title  of  priest) 
there  is  an  express  declaration  that  *' sacrifice  is 
now  no  part  of  the  Church  ministry."!  Notable 
that  of  Elevation,  of  Adoration  of  a  local  Presence, 
of  Fasting  Communion  as  a  duty,  there  is  not  a 
word. 


are  in  themselves  it  skilleth  not  ; 
it  is  enough  that  to  me  which  take 
them  they  are  the  body  and  blood 
of  Christ,  his  promise  in  witness 
hereof  sufficeth,  his  word  he 
knoweth  which  way  to  accom- 
plish ;  why  should  any  cogitation 
possess  the  mind  of  a  faithful 
communicant  but  this,  '  O,  my 
God,  thou  art  true,  0,  my  soul, 
thou  art  happy  '  ?" 

Hooker's  own  view  is  absolutely 
clear  (sect.  6) :  "  The  real  pre- 
sence of  Christ's  most  blessed 
Body  and  Blood  is  not  to  be 
sought  in  the  Sacrament,  but  in 
the  worthy  receiver  of  the  Sacra- 
ment." But  he  is  content  to  put 
aside  all  discussions  of  theory, 


and  to  meet  on  the  basis  of  tlie 
'O/xoXoyovfieva,  which  he  gives 
above. 

*  See  chap.  xxix.  It  is  true  that 
the  reference  is  to  public  prayer  ; 
but  there  are  quotations  from 
St.  Jerome  and  St.  Chrysostom 
connecting  the  subject  with  the 
administration  of  the  Holy  Com- 
munion, and  it  is  clear  that 
Cartwright  dealt  with  the  sur- 
plice in  that  connection.  If 
other  vestments  had  not  been 
practically  obsolete,  it  seems 
impossible  that  they  should  not 
have  been  specially  mentioned 
for  attack  and  defence, 
t  See  chap.  Ixxviii.  2. 


46  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

But  it  is  rather  on  tlie  great  positive  lines  of  his 
argument  that  I  would  dwell. 

In  that  reference  of  all  to  the  Incarnation,  it  is 
significantly  implied  that,  when  we  can  form  a  theory 
of  the  method  of  the  union  of  the  two  natures  of  our 
Blessed  Lord,  then,  and  not  till  then,  shall  we  be  able 
rightly  to  theorize  as  to  the  method  of  sacramental 
efficacy,  uniting  the  soul  in  Christ  to  God.  In  that 
general  exposition  of  a  real  presence  of  Christ  in  the 
Church,  I  trace  again  an  all-important  truth — in  the 
refusal  to  restrict  that  real  presence  to  the  Holy 
Communion,  and  to  separate  that  great  Sacrament 
absolutely  from  all  other  means  of  His  presence 
with  us,  and  therefore  from  that  law  of  spiritual  and 
conditional  reception,  which  in  all  others  is  acknow- 
ledged by  all.  In  that  noble  plea  for  unity  on  the 
basis  of  essential  truth,  and  for  reverent  abstinence 
from  rash  controversies  of  over-definition,  I  trace  the 
spirit  which  rules  in  our  Prayer  Book,  and  which 
has  been  the  guiding  principle  of  our  Euglish  Church.. 

In  these  things,  again.  Hooker  speaks  to  us.  It  is 
most  unhappy,  yet  it  may  be  inevitable,  that,  just  as 
in  the  Enghsh  Eeformation,  so  now — when  its  basis 
is  openly  or  virtually  attacked — round  what  should 
be  the  very  shrine  of  peace  and  reverence  there 
should  rage  a  strife  of  angry  tougues,  the  precursor 
(it  may  be)  of  schism  and  disruption.  But  through 
that  strife  if  we  are  to  pass  safely,  I  cannot  but  think 
that  Hooker's  main  principles  will  be  our  best  guide. 


RICHARD   HOOKER.  47 

(C.)  But  I  pass,  next,  to  the  third  great  section  of 
his  work,  published  in  partial  incompleteness  after 
his  death,  which  deals  with  Church  government. 

Its  object  was  to  resist  the  imposition  on  the 
Church  of  Presbyterian  government,  as  of  Divine 
Scriptural  right,  to  defend  the  principle  of  Episcopal 
government,  and  the  right  function  of  the  Eoyal 
Supremacy. 

(a)  The  first  section  on  the  claim  for  Lay  Elder- 
ship of  Divine  Eight,  contained  in  the  sixth  book, 
has  utterly  perished.  We  can  hardly  doubt  that 
it  has  been  wilfully  destroyed ;  for  that  it  existed 
and  was  carefully  discussed  with  his  friends  we  have 
satisfactory  proof.*  After  the  Introduction,  all  else 
is  gone :  a  fragment  is  substituted,  evidently  from 
Hooker's  hand,  on  the  administration  of  Church 
discipline,  Confession,  and  Absolution,  directed  in  its 
arojument  rather  asfainst  Rome  than  ao-ainst  Geneva. 


*  This  is  incontrovertibly  !  his  death  his  MSS.  were  torn 
established  by  Mr.  Keble  in  his  ;  and  burut  by  "  Mr.  Cbarke  and 
Preface,  first  by  examination  of  another  minister  that  dwelt  near 
the  present  sixth  book  itself,  Canterbury."  The  sixth  book 
next  by  comparison  with  a  ]MS.  !  would  certainly  be  the  most 
in  the  Hbrar}-  of  Corpus  Christi  ^  obnoxious  to  the  adherents  of 
College,  Oxford,  which  contains  '  the  Puritan  party.  Bishop  An- 
remarks  and  criticisms  by  Sandys  ,  drewes,  in  a  letter  written  imme- 
and  George  Cranmer  on  Hooker's  [  diately  on  the  news  of  Hooker's 
original  draft.  There  seems  no  !  death,  expresses  his  fear  that 
suflScient  reason  to  doubt  the  [  they  might  be  "  embezelled  and 
account  which  Walton  gives  of  a  |  come  to  nothing,"  or,  if  not,  per- 
confession  by  Hooker's  widow  to  j  haps  fall  into  bands  which  might 
the  Bishop  of  London,  that  after  ,  mutilate  or  suppress  them. 


48  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say  that  it  stands  up  firmly, 
and  decisively  against  the  assertion  of  Auricular 
Confession  and  Private  Absolution  as  a  "  Sacrament 
of  Penance,"  or  that  it  meets  the  bold  claim  of 
Catholic  authority  for  such  assertion,  by  investi- 
gating the  well-known  historical  growth  of  the  prac- 
tice in  the  Church.  At  that  time  no  one,  professing 
to  hold  the  Anglican  position,  would  have  dreamt  of 
using  any  other  language.  At  that  time  no  one 
could  possibly  ignore  or  forget  the  fatal  effect  of  the 
imposition  of  the  system,  on  Christian  liberty,  on 
individual  responsibility,  on  the  true  relation  of 
laity  and  clergy  in  the  Church.  This  fragment 
of  Hooker  will  reward  careful  study.  Bat  I  pass 
it  by  with  brief  notice,  because  it  lies  outside  the 
great  work,  with  which  we  are  at  present  con- 
cerned. 

(b)  The  other  two  books  remain,  taken  from 
Hooker's  rough  drafts,  and  therefore  imperfect  in 
some  parts,  and  perhaps  interpolated  in  others,  but 
in  substantial  preservation.* 

Let  us  glance  first  at  the  argument  for  Episco- 
pacy, and  at  the  treatment  of  Apostolical  succes- 
sion, in  the  seventh  book. 

In  the  defence  of  Episcopacy  it  seems  clear 
enough  that  in  Hooker,   as    in  the  authoritative 


*  On  this,  again,  see  Keble's  J  were  not  published    till    about 
Preface.    The  last  three  books  \  fifty  years  after  Hooker's  death. 


EICHAED   HOOKER.  49 

documents  of  the  Church  of  Euglaud,*  it  is  the 
historical  method  of  argument  (in  itself  all  but 
unassailable)  which  is  followed.  Episcopacy  was 
attacked  on  two  sides  in  the  name  of  Divine  right. 
The  Pope,  as  the  Vicar  of  Christ,  claimed  to  over- 
ride and  to  extenuate  its  authority .f  The  Puritan 
party,  on  the  plea  of  a  Scriptural  title  for  their  own 
Presbyterian  government,  denounced  it  utterly  as 
an  usurpation.  The  time  was  to  come,  ere  long, 
from  the  day  of  Bancroft's  celebrated  Sermon  at 
Paul's  Cross  onwards,  when  both  attacks  were  to  be 
not  only  met,  but  retorted,  by  the  claim  of  a  Divine 
right  for  Episcopacy,^  gradually  (though  with  a 
hesitation  widely  different  from  the  sweeping  asser- 
tions of  later  days)  tending  to  "  unchurch "  non- 
Episcopal  bodies.  But  it  had  not  come  yet.  Hooker 
refers  to  a  cognate  form  of  this  trenchant  argument 
as  the  shortest  way  against  his  antagonists,  but  ex- 
pressly refuses  to  take  it.§     It  seems,  indeed,  toler- 


*  Compare  Art.  xxiii.,  empha- 
sizing the  mission  and  the  autho- 
rity of  tlie  ministry  in  itself,  as 


on  this  subject  in  the  Council  of 
Trent. 

X  Heylin,  when  he   entitles 


called  and  sent  by  "  those  who  |  Laud  "  Cyprianus  Anglicanus," 
have  publick  authority  given  [  indicates  by  a  true  instinct  the 
them  in  tlie  congregation,"  with  \  position  of  the  school  which  he 
the  statement  in  the  Preface  to  I  represents,   in   the    assertion   of 


the  Ordinal,  "It  is  evident  that 
from  the  Apostles'  time  there 
have  been  these  orders  of  minis- 
ters in  Christ's  Church  :  Bishops, 
Priests,  and  Deacons." 
t  See,  for  example,  the  struggle 


Episcopacy  against  both   anta- 
gonists. 

§  See  Book  III.  chap.  x.  sect.  8. 
His  words  are  very  strong.  "  The 
very  best  way  for  us,  and  the 
strongest  against  them,  were  to 


[king's  coll.]  E 


50 


MASTEES   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 


ably  clear,  that  as  he  went  on  with  his  great  work, 
the  claim  of  Episcopacy  to  a  distinctly  Apostolic 
derivation,  strengthened  itself  by  investigation  in 
his  mind.  Between  the  third  and  the  seventh  books, 
there  is  surely  considerable  difference  of  tone  *  But 
the  main  character  of  his  argument  remains  the 
same.  His  principles  are  simply  these.  First,  all 
the  promises  and  blessings  of  the  Church  belong 
to  it  as  a  whole.  Next,  there  being  no  formal 
rule  of  Church  polity  laid  down  in  Holy  Scripture, 
the  form  of  government  lay  in  the  power  of  the 
Church  itself  to  determine.  Thirdly,  from  the 
beginning,  even  from  Apostolic  times,  that  form  has 
been  Episcopal.  "A  thousand  five  hundred  years 
and  upward  the  Church  of  Christ  hath  now  con- 
tinued  under    the    sacred    regiment    of    Bishops.t 


hold,  even  as  they  do,  that  in 
Scripture  there  must  needs  be 
fouud  some  particular  form  of 
Church  polity,  which  God  hath 
instituted,  and  which  for  that 
veiy  cause  belongeth  to  all 
Churches  to  all  times.  But  with 
any  such  partial  eye  to  respect 
ourselves,  and  by  cunning  to 
make  those  things  seem  the 
truest  which  are  the  fittest  for 
our  purpose,  is  a  thing  which  we 
neither  like  nor  mean  to  follow." 
*  Hooker  seems  to  avow  this 
in  Book  VIII.,  chap,  xi.,  sect.  8  : 
"  I  did  myself  sometimes  judge 
it  a  great  deal  more  probable 


than  I  do  now,  merely  that, 
after  the  apostles  were  deceased, 
churches  did  agree  among  them- 
selves, for  preservation  of  peace 
and  order,  to  make  one  presbyter 
in  each  city  chief  over  the  rest." 
But  it  is  sufficiently  evident  in 
the  whole  tone  of  the  book.  See 
Mr.  Keble's  Preface,  and  a  pam- 
phlet by  Bishop  Wordsworth  (of 
St.  Andrews)  in  controversy  with 
Principal  Tulloch,  "A  Plea  for 
Justice  to  Presbyterian  Students 
of  Theology,  and  the  Einscopal 
Church." 

t  Book  VII.,  chap,  i.,  sect.  4. 


KICIIAED   HOOKER.  ^1 

Hence,  lastly,  even  taking  the  lower  yiew  of  uni- 
versal Chnrcli  custom,  it  is  rash  and  presumptuous 
to  overthrow  it ;  but,  taking  "  the  generally  received 
persuasion,  held  from  the  first  beginning,  that  the 
Apostles  themselves  left  Bishops  invested  with 
power,"  it  may  be  '*  boldly  and  peremptorily  "  con- 
cluded that  "  if  anything  in  the  Church's  govern- 
ment, surely  the  first  constitution  of  Bishops  was 
from  Heaven,  was  even  of  God ;  the  Holy  Ghost 
was  the  author  of  it."  On  these  principles  he 
examines  historically  the  existence  and  authority  of 
Bishops  from  the  earliest  times ;  he  distinguishes 
(with  a  good  sense  and  honesty,  not  always  found  in 
champions  of  Episcopacy)  the  assertion  of  the  Epi- 
scopal office  from  the  criticism  of  the  Scriptural 
use  of  the  name  'ETrtWoTro?,  and  the  accessories  of 
the  office,  in  dignity,  in  scope  of  administration,  in 
degree  of  secular  power,  from  the  office  itself.  His 
theoretical  conclusion  is  that  which  all  historical 
investigation  strengthens  every  day — "Episcopacy 
has  been,  and  is,  and  therefore,  it  ought  to  be  rever- 
enced and  preserved,"  rather  than,  "  It  ought  to  be 
in  the  abstract,  and  therefore  it  has  been  and  it  is." 
His  practical  conclusion  is  that  which  the  Church  of 
England  has  drawn — to  preserve  that  government 
for  herself,  on  the  ground  of  an  Apostolic  origin, 
yet  never  to  declare  that  they  who  have  it  not  are 
by  this  cut  off  from  the  Church  of  Christ,  and 
thrown  back  simply  on  an  individual  Christianity. 

E  2 


52  MASTEES   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

8ince  liis  day  that  question  has  been  discussed 
by  various  schools  of  thought.  Historical  criticism 
has  (I  think)  strengthened  the  claims  of  Episcopacy 
to  Apostolic  derivation;  experience  in  the  Church 
has  certainly  shown  its  practical  value  as  a  system, 
and  its  intimate  connection  with  most  important 
elements  of  primitive  CJiurch  or  linance  and  spirit. 
But  still  it  may  be  doubted  whether  we  are  not 
on  all  sides  coming  back  substantially  to  Hooker's 
leading  principles,  asserting  them  boldly  on  the 
ground  of  historical  truth,  and  refusing  to  be 
tempted  by  the  apparent  necessities  of  controversy 
to  assert  more. 

(c)  But,  lastly,  I  come  to  his  exposition  in  the 
eighth  book  of  the  principle  of  the  Eoyal  Supremacy, 
— what  it  is,  what  it  means. 

In  Hooker  we  find  distinctly  formulated  the  prin- 
ciple which  guided  onr  English  Keformation — the 
claim  of  a  conditioned  independence  of  National 
Churches.  I  need  not  say  that  in  his  view  it  was 
conditioned,  not  only  by  Holy  Scripture,  but  by  the 
relation  to  the  Church  Catholic,  of  which  it  formed 
a  part — a  relation  binding  it  to  certain  great  laws 
of  constitution,  and  submitting  its  actions  to  the 
supremacy  of  a  true  General  Council. 

But  what  is  a  National  Church  ?  He  leaves  us  in 
no  doubt  whatever.  Considering  the  true  historical 
growth  of  the  Church  of  England,  rather  tlian  any 
abstract  definition  of  what,  under  different  circum- 


KICHARD   HOOKER. 


53 


stances,  it  might  have  been,  he  lays  down  clearly 
the  principles  implied  again  and  again,  alike  in 
tlie  Statutes  of  the  Eealm,  and  the  Constitution 
of  the  Church.  To  speak  of  any  relations  between 
Church  and  State  as  two  separate  bodies  would 
have  seemed  to  him  absurd.  They  were  simply  co- 
extensive. "  There  is  not  "  (he  says)  "  any  member 
of  the  commonwealth  which  is  not  also  a  member 
of  the  Church."*  True,  that  men  were  born  into 
the  one,  baptized  into  the  other.  But  in  those 
days  to  be  unbaptized  was  a  thing  so  monstrous  as 


*  See  Book  VIII.  chap.  i.  sect. 
2.  The  whole  of  the  well-known 
passage  deserves  quotation : — 
"  With  us  therefore  the  name  of  a 
church  importeth  only  a  society 
of  men,  first  united  into  some 
public  form  of  regiment,  and 
secondly  distinguished  from  other 
societies  by  the  exercise  of  Chris- 
tian religion.  With  them  on 
the  other  side  the  name  of  the 
Church  in  this  present  question 
importetli  not  only  a  multitude 
of  men  so  united  and  so  distin- 
guished, but  also  further  the 
same  divided  necessarily  and 
perpetually  from  the  body  of  the 
commonwealth  ;  so  that  even  in 
such  a  politic  society  as  coti- 
sisteth  of  none  but  Christians, 
yet  the  Church  of  Christ  and  the 
commonwealth  are  two  corpora- 
tions, independently  each  sub- 
sisting by  itself. 

"  We  hold,  that  seeing  there  is 


not  any  man  of  the  Church  of 
j  England  but  the  same  man  is 
j  also  a  member  or  the  common- 
wealth ;  nor  any  man  a  member 
of  the  commonwealth  which  is 
'  not  also  of  the  Church  of  Eng- 
'  land ;  therefore  as   in   a   figure 
triangular  the  base   doth  differ 
■  from  the  sides  thereof,  and  yet 
[  one    and   the   selfsame  line  is 
I  both  a  base  and  also  a  side ;  a 
'  side  simply,  a  bas3  if  it  chance 
to  be  the  bottom  and  imderlie 
the  rest :    so,  albeit   properties 
and  actions  of  one  kind  do  cause 
:  the  name  of  a   commonwealth, 
qualities  and  functions   of  an- 
other sort  the  namy  of  a  Clmrch 
to  be  given  unto  a   multitude, 
yet  one  and  the  selfsame  multi- 
tude may  in  such  sort  be  both, 
and  is  so  with  us,  that  no  person 
appertaining  to  tiie  one  can  be 
deuiud  to  be  also  of  the  other." 


54 


MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY 


to  condemn  to  a  virtual  outlawry.  True,  that  men 
had  civil  duties  to  the  whole  community  as  a  State, 
spiritual  duties  to  it  as  a  Church.  But  in  those 
days  to  refuse  the  one  was  held  as  much  a  treason 
as  to  refuse  the  other. 

The  Eoyal  Supremacy*  in  the  Church  in  itself 
meant  (as  we  have  already  said)  what  it  did  in  the 
State — the  assertion  of  National  Unity  and  In- 
dependence. As  against  the  Papal  Supremacy — 
the  culmination  of  sacerdotal  pretension — it  also 
meant  the  distinct  assertion  of  the  authority  of  the 
whole  body  over  the  clergy,  as  being  only  a  part  of 
the  Church.f  But,  in  both  Church  and  State  the 
Royal  authority  was  meant  to  be  a  Constitutional 
authority.  Every  attempt  to  make  it  despotic  pro- 
ceeded fari  passu  in  both  ;   the  Star  Chamber  and 


*  Hooker  is  exceedingly  care- 
ful to  define  and  limit  the  Head- 
siiip  attached  to  the  Crown,  in 
contradistinction  to  the  Supreme 
Headship  of  Christ.  But  it  was 
safer  and  wiser  to  exchange  the 
title  altogether  (as  Elizabeth  did) 
for  one  which  expressed  clearly 
that  "in  terming  our  princes 
heads  of  the  Clmrch,  we  do  but 
testify  that  we  acknowledge 
them  as  Governors." 

t  See  Book  VIII.  chap,  ii.  sect. 
4.  "  Unto  which  supreme  power 
in  kings  two  kinds  of  adversaries 
there  are  that  have  opposed 
themselves ;  one  sect  defending 
that  supreme   power  in  causes 


ecclesiastical  throughout  the 
world  appertaineth  of  divine 
right  to  the  Bishop  of  Eome  ; 
in  other  sect  that  the  said  power 
belonging  in  every  national 
Church  uuto  the  clergy  thereof 
assembled.  We  did  defend  as 
well  as  against  the  one  as  against 
the  other."  See  also  chap.  vi. 
sect.  8.  •'  It  is  a  thing  most  con- 
sonant with  equity  and  reason 
that  no  ecclesiastical  law  be 
made  in  a  Christian  common- 
wealth, without  consent  as  w^ell 
of  the  laity  as  of  the  clergy;  but 
least  of  all  without  consent  of 
the  higliest  power." 


RICHAED   HOOKER. 


55 


the  High  Commission  Court  were  twin-born  instru- 
ments of  absolutism.  All  laws  regulating  the 
Church  were  to  be  passed  by  the  whole  body,  the 
clergy  in  Convocation,  the  laity  in  Parliament,  with 
the  assent  of  the  Crown.*  So  passed,  the  supreme 
judicial  and  executive  authority,  to  ascertain  and 
enforce  them,  lay  naturally  in  the  Crown,  as 
"  supreme  in  all  causes,  ecclesiastical  as  well  as  civil." 
This  was  the  system  w^hich  Hooker  contemplated 
as  existent,  and  determined  to  defend.  No  absolutist 
was  he.     Whatever  his  respect  for  authority,  there 


*  Seecbap.vii.sect.il.  "The 
Parliament  of  England,  together 
with  the  Convocation  annexed 
thereunto,  is  that  whereupon  the 
very  essence  of  all  government 
within  this  kingdom  doth  de- 
pend ;  it  is  even  the  body  of  the 
whole  realm;  it  consisteth  of  the 
king,  and  of  all  that  within  the 
land  are  subject  unto  him  :  for 
they  all  are  there  present,  either 
in  person  or  by  such  as  they 
voluntarily  have  derived  their 
very  personal  right  unto.  The 
Parliament  is  a  court  not  so 
merely  temporal  as  if  it  might 
meddle  with  nothing  but  only 
leather  and  wool.  .  .  ." 

"  The  most  natural  and  reli- 
gious course  in  making  of  laws 
is,  that  the  matter  of  them  be 
taken  from  the  judgment  of  the 
wisest  in  those  things  which 
they  are  to  concern.  In  matters 
of  God,  to  set  down  a  form  of 


public  prayer,  a  solemn  confes- 
sion of  the  articles  of  Christian 
faith,  rites  and  ceremonies  meet 
for  the  exercise  of  religion ;  it 
were  unnatural  not  to  think  the 
pastors  and  bishops  of  our  souls 
a  great  deal  more  fit,  than  men 
of  secular  trades  and  callings : 
howbeit,  when  all  which  the 
wisdom  of  all  sorts  can  do  is 
done  for  devising  of  laws  in  the 
Church,  it  is  the  general  consent 
of  all  that  giveth  them  the  form 
and  vigour  of  laws,  without 
which  they  could  be  no  more 
unto  us  than  the  counsels  of 
physicians  to  the  sick:  well 
might  they  seem  as  wholesome 
admonitions  and  instructions, 
but  laws  could  they  never  be 
without  consent  of  the  whole 
Church,  which  is  the  only  thing 
that  bindeth  each  member  of 
the  Church,  to  be  guided  by 
them." 


56  MASTERS   IN    ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

is  in  birn  no  shadow  of  that  false  inference  from 
the  "  Divine  Eight "  of  Kings,  of  absolutism  in  the 
Crown  and  the  duty  of  passive  obedience  in  the  sub- 
ject, which  was  the  fatal  error  of  the  great  divines 
of  the  Stuart  period.  What  he  said  as  to  authority 
over  civil  society,  he  would  have  said,  with  equal 
emphasis  at  least,  in  relation  to  the  ecclesiastical. 
"  For  any  prince  or  potentate,  without  express  com- 
mission from  God,  to  exercise  the  same  of  himself 
— it  is  no  better  than  mere  tyranny."  For,  un- 
doubtedly, he  held  that  the  action  of  the  Church, 
the  clergy,  and  the  laity  alike,  had  the  spiritual 
authority  derived  from  the  blessing  and  the  in- 
dwelling presence  of  Christ.  It  were  worse  than 
tyranny  to  set  this  aside,  or  override  it. 

Such  was  Hooker's  system,  certainly  in  itself 
plain,  simple,  and  coherent,  in  relation  to  the  state 
of  things  which  then  existed.  It  was,  indeed,  but 
the  formulation  of  the  principles  on  which  Church 
action  in  England,  especially  in  the  Reformation, 
but  even  before  the  Reformation,  had  long  proceeded. 
It  acknowledged  (as  our  Article  does)  a  limitation 
of  the  Royal  power,  by  the  existence  of  a  sacred 
Ministry,  which  that  power  could  neither  exercise 
nor  confer.  For  conflict  between  the  royal  and. the 
ministerial  power  it  saw  no  necessity,  and  laid  down 
no  rule. 

But  I  need  hardly  say  that  now  the  condition 
of  things  then  existing  is  of  the  past.      From  the 


KICHAED  HOOKER.  57 

day  that  Nonconformity  was  first  tolerated,  then 
gradually  recognised,  and  relieved  of  all  civil  dis- 
ability, it  passed  away  as  a  complete  and  coherent 
system ;  thougli  traces  of  it  remain  still  in  our 
laws.  The  Puritan  contention  (opposed  by  Hooker) 
"that  the  Church  and  the  commonwealth  are  two 
societies,  of  which  the  one  comprehendeth  always 
persons  not  belonging  to  the  other,"  is  now  realised 
unquestionably  in  fact. 

Hooker's  argument,  as  such,  is  made  obsolete  by  this 
change.  But  it  has  still  a  twofold  interest.  First  it 
illustrates  to  us,  with  an  unmistakable  precision  and 
completeness,  what  was  the  great  principle  involved 
in  the  Eoyal  Supremacy,  as  recognised  at  the  Ee- 
formation,*  and  warns  us  against  common  fallacies, 
which  strangely  misunderstand  its  nature.  Next,  it 
suggests  to  us  that  they  are  really  pursuing  the  policy 
which  made  the  Church  of  England  what  it  has  been, 
who  endeavour,  mutatis  mutandis,  to  secure  now  some 
similar  government  for  the  Church — a  government 
which  shall  fully  recognise  the  rights  of  the  laity — 
a  government  which  shall  claim  the  power  to  legis- 
late for  the  Church,  with  the  same  authority  and 
the  same  faith  as  in  the  days  gone  by,  refusing  to 


*  Of  course,  I  do  not    mean  which  coul4  be  set  up  against  it, 

that  there  were  in  practice  no  and   which    in    England — witli 

deviations    from    it.       In    the  whatever    theoretical    inconsist- 

conflict  against  the  Papal  autho-  ency — had  constantly  defied  and 

rity    men    caught    often    very  limited  it  for  centuries  past, 
rashly    at    the    only    authority 


58  MASTEES   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

believe  that  the  Church  of  the  nineteenth  century  is 
inferior  in  that  authority  and  in  the  grounds  of  that 
faith  to  the  Church  of  the  sixteenth.  No  doubt  there 
is  this  important  difference  attaching  to  all  religious 
bodies,  that  in  the  ultimate  resort,  some  supremacy 
of  a  State,  now  larger  than  any  religious  body  within 
it,  must  be  recognised  over  all;  and  that  over  an 
Established  Church  there  are  special  rights,  in 
virtue  of  Establishment,  which  the  Church — unless 
they  make  disestablishment  a  spiritual  necessity — 
must  be  content  to  acknowledge.  But  this  difference 
great  as  it  is,  touches  not  the  main  point.  Self- 
government,  in  some  sense,  has  been,  from  the  days 
of  the  Keformation  onwards,  claimed  for  the  Church 
of  England.  On  its  right  to  self-government  Hooker 
(I  repeat)  speaks  to  us  now. 

IV.  These  are  (as  it  seems  to  me)  the  great  theo- 
logical principles  of  Hooker's  '  Ecclesiastical  Polity.' 
It  is  as  a  theologian  alone  that  I  desire  to  regard 
him.  Therefore  I  do  not  think  it  necessary  to  dwell 
at  any  length  on  the  place  which  he  occupies,  by 
consent  of  all,  in  our  English  literature.  After  the 
English  Bible  and  the  English  Prayer  Book,  his  is 
(be  it  remembered)  almost  the  first  great  work  of 
English  prose.  No  one  can  well  fail  to  appreciate 
the  diginty  and  massive  eloquence  of  his  style; 
stately,  indeed,  and  at  times  intricate,  but  never 
obscure  or  cumbrous:  now  glowing  with  a  grave 
enthusiasm,  now  lighted  up  by  a  grave  yet  forcible 


KICHARD   HOOKER.  59 

liimiour.  ]^o  one,  comparing  him  with  other  divines 
of  his  own  and  the  succeeding  generation,  can  look 
without  wonder  and  admiration  on  the  profound 
learning,  often  implied  rather  than  expressed,  so 
borne  as  to  be  free  from  all  cumbrousness,  always 
strengthening,  never  overloading,  his  reasoning.  No 
one  can  be  blind  to  the  singular  fairness  of  argument, 
and  the  well-balanced  comprehensiveness  of  idea, 
which  have  won  for  him  the  title  of  "  the  judicious." 
In  all  these  points  it  is,  indeed,  marvellous  to  note 
how  the  newborn  English  prose  starts  out  in  him 
full  armed,  in  some  excellences,  at  least,  afterwards 
unsurpassed. 

But  it  is  with  his  theological  principles  that  we 
have  to  do.  Their  importance  lies  first  (as  I  have 
said)  in  the  fact  that  by  him  we  see,  brought  out  in 
clear,  explicit  words,  the  chief  principles  which,  im- 
plied and  embodied  in  the  Keformation,  fixed  our 
Anglican  position  from  the  first,  on  a  basis  far 
different  from  the  artificial  groundwork  of  the  foreign 
Protestantism,  and  the  shifting  foundations  of  the 
Gallican  system. 

It  lies  next  in  the  fact  that  Hooker,  although  he 
founded — perhaps  because  he  founded — no  esj)ecial 
school,  has,  perhaps  more  than  any  other  single 
writer,  given  to  our  Anglican  theology  a  tone  and  a 
direction  which  it  has  never  lost. 

Bat,  most  of  all,  to  my  mind,  it  lies  in  the  fact 
that  his  principles  have  a  depth  and  breadth  and 


60  MASTEKS   IN    ENGLISH    THEOLOGY: 

soundness,  which  enables  them,  in  a  very  special 
degree,  to  live  still,  so  as,  mutatis  mutandis,  to  deal 
even  with  present  controversies,  and  to  guide  us 
even  in  our  present  trials. 

These  results  at  any  time  might  well  reward  care- 
ful study  of  his  works.  But  at  this  time  especially — 
a  time  critical  enough  both  of  creeds  and  institutions 
— but  a  time  (thank  God !)  of  much  excitement  of 
religious  thought,  much  revival  of  spiritual  enthu- 
siasm, much  quickening  of  practical  activity — 
perhaps  our  greatest  want  of  all  is  that  of  a  deep 
and  true  theology.  Any  study,  whether  of  the  past 
or  the  present,  which  may  contribute,  even  slightly, 
to  filling  up  that  need,  must  tend  in  its  measure 
to  the  well-being  of  humanity,  and  therefore  to  the 
glory  of  God. 


LANCELOT   ANDREWES,  D.D. 

BISHOP  OF  WINCHESTER. 

BoKN  1555;  Died  1626. 


Place  of  Andrewes  in  tlie  history  of  the  English  Church  and 
English  theology, — Contemporary  both  with  Hooker  and  Laud. 
— Contrast  with  Hooker.— Influence  of  Andrewes  from  position 
in  society,  puldic  character,  sermons,  &c.,  friendships,  connection 
with  events  of  James  I.'s  reign. — Carries  on  Hooker's  resistance  to 
Puritanism  and  Calvinistic  theology. — Returns  to  Primitive 
Church  as  standard  and  model.  —  Consistency  with  ideas  of  the 
Reformation. — Reformation  not  a  single  event  or  epoch,  but  a 
long  process  of  attempted  improvement ;  unsystematic,  tentative, 
progressive:  tendency  to  combine  and  reconcile  old  and  new. — 
Dangers  to  religion  in  James  I.'s  reign  :  1.  Shock  to  authority. 
2.  Roman  aggressiveness  and  strength.  3.  Exclusive  claims,  theo- 
logical and  ecclesiastical,  of  Puritanism. — Andrewes  reverts  to 
Early  Church  theology,  for  larger  and  more  jn-imitive  teaching. — 
Effect  on  thought,  and  on  controversy,  of  increased  learning. — 
Andrewes  a  controversialist,  directly  against  Rome  :  character  of 
the  Roman  controversy  in  his  hands. — Opposition  of  Puritanism, 
indirect,  in  exhibition  of  positive,  higher,  more  precise  teaching. — 
His  sermons. — Andrewes,  in  his  inner  and  spiritual  life. — His 
"Devotions." — How  they  illustrate  his  preaching.— Dithculties  of 
his  position. — What  he  did,  and  did  not  do.  1.  Failed  to  check 
immediate  victory  of  Puritanism  :  connection  of  his  school  with 
Stuart  political  doctrines.  2.  Permanently  enlarged  and  elevated 
theology  of  the  English  and  Reformed  Church :  established  its 
true  relations  to  the  ancient  and  the  universal  Church. 

Bishop  Andrewes  holds  au  important  place  in  the 
line  of  those  En  owlish  divines  who  have  affected  the 


62  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

course  of  English  tlieology.  Only  two  years  younger 
than  Hooker,  his  life  and  his  influence  were  prolonged 
for  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  century  after  Hooker's 
comparatively  early  death.*  He  had  been  Hooker's 
contemporary,  a  student  and  labourer  in  the  same 
field,  perhaps  his  friend,  certainly  his  admirer,  in  the 
later  years  of  Elizabeth  ;  and  when  Elizabeth's  world, 
and  Hooker's,  closed  with  the  sixteenth  century, 
Andre wes  lived  on,  and  won  his  fame  in  the  new 
w^orld  which  opened  with  the  seventeenth.  His 
mind  and  character  were  those  of  a  man  who  had 
come  to  middle  age,  and  passed  beyond  it,  under 
the  last  of  the  Tudors.f  With  this  training  and 
experience,  the  main  work  of  his  life  coincided 
nearly  with  the  reign  of  the  first  of  the  Stuarts.J 
Thus,  though  belonging  to  Hooker's  generation, 
he  lived  to  see  Charles  I.  on  the  throne,  and 
Laud  in  his  first  bishopric,  and  to  be  looked  up 
to  and  studied  by  the  men  of  Laud's  generation 
as  the  greatest  living  theologian  of  the  English 
Church.  He  is  the  connecting  link  between  Hooker 
and  Laud,§  and  after  Laud,  Cosin  and  Jeremy 
Taylor  and  Hammond,  Ken  and  Bull,  Beveridge  and 
Bishop  Wilson.  II 


*  Hooker,  b.  1553     ..      ..     Andrewes,  b.  1555. 
Hooker,  d.  1600     ..      ..     Audi'ewes,  d.  1626. 
t    Eliz.  d.  1603. 

X  James  L  d.  1625;  Andrewes  d.  1626. 
§  See  Hallam,  Const.  Hist.  ii.  62.     Literature,  ii.  308. 
II  See  footnote  on  opposite  page. 


LANCELOT   ANDEEWES. 


63 


Of  Andrewes'  long  life  tliere  is  not  mucli  to  be  said. 
It  was  the  life,  during  the  first  part  of  it,  of  a  severe 
and  resolute  student,  unsparing  of  time  and  labour. 
His  morning  hours  of  study  were  to  the  last 
jealously  guarded;  the  rare  exceptions  to  his  usual 
sweetness  and  gentleness  of  temper  w^ere  provoked 
by  those  who  disturbed  these  hours.  *'  They  were  no 
true,  scholars,"  he  used  to  say,  "  who  came  to  speak 
with  him  before  noon."  He  became  specially  distin- 
guished as  a  "  Catechetical  "  teacher,  both  at  College 
and  in  London,  and  he  was  "deeply  seen  in  cases  of 


The  following  comparative  dates  may  be  convenient: — 


Hooker. 

Andrewes. 

Bacon. 

Field. 

Donne. 

Laud. 

b.  1553; 

b.  1555; 

b.  1560-1  ; 

b.  1561; 



M.A.,  1577 ; 

M.A..  1578 ; 

Gray's  Inn, 
1577; 

b.  1573; 

b.  1573; 

Temple, 

In  Parlmt., 

1534; 

St.  PauVs, 

1584; 

.. 

At  Line's 

Bosconibe, 

1589; 

Inn, 1590 ; 

1591; 

E.P.i.-iv., 

,, 

,, 

Line's  Inn, 

With  Essex, 

1594; 

1594; 

1596; 

E.P.  v.. 

, . 

M.A., 

1597; 

1598; 

d.  1600. 

Dean  of 

Westmr., 

1601; 

Bp.  Cliiches., 

1605; 

Sol.-Gen., 
1607; 

M.  1603, 
or  1604; 

Bishop  Ely, 

.. 

Ordained, 

President 

1609; 

d.  1616. 

1613? 

St.  John's, 
1611; 

Bp.Winton., 

Chancellor, 

.. 

Dn.  Glouc, 

1619; 

1618-19; 

1615; 

,. 

Sentenced, 

., 

Dn.St.  Paul's, 

Bishop  St. 

1621; 

1621; 

David's. 
1621 ; 

d.  Sept., 

d.  April, 

Bp.  B.  &  W., 

1626. 

1626. 

d.  1631. 

1626; 
Bp.  Loud., 

1628; 
Abp.  Cant, 

1633. 

64  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

conscience."  At  St.  Paul's,  where  he  was  Canon,  he 
read  the  Divinity  Lecture  three  times  a  week  in  term 
time ;  and  he  is  described  as  walking  about  the  aisle, 
ready  to  give  advice  and  spiritual  counsel  to  any  who 
sought  it.  At  Westminster,  where  he  was  Dean,  he 
toolv  the  greatest  interest  in  the  boys  of  the  school. 
He  would  come  into  school  and  teach  them  himself, 
daring  the  absence  of  the  master.  Bishop  Hacket, 
a  Westminster  scholar  under  him,  records  his  care 
about  their  studies  and  the  books  they  read,  and 
describes  his  walks  to  Chiswick  "  with  a  brace  of  his 
young  fry,"  and  his  "dexterity  in  that  w^ayfaring 
leisure,  to  fill  these  narrow  vessels  with  a  fun- 
nel." *  W^hen  he  was  called  into  public  emplo}^- 
ment,  he  lived,  as  great  Church  officers  did  in  those 
days,  through  a  round  of  sermons,  Court  attendances, 
and  judicial  or  ecclesiastical  business,  varied  by 
occasional  controversies  and  sharp  encounters,  on 
paper  or  face  to  face,  with  the  numberless  foes  and 
detractors  of  the  English  Church  and  State ; — from 
great  Cardinals,  like  Bellarmine  and  Duperron,  to 
obscure  sectaries,  like  Barrow  and  Mr.  Traske,  the 
reviver  of  a  mongrel  Judaism.f  It  was  the  life  of 
many  men  of  that  period.  What  is  specially  to  be 
noticed  in  his  case,  is  the  high  standard  which  was 
recognised  both  in  his  learning  and  his  life.     *'  Our 


*  Henry  Isaacson's  Life,  with  Notes,  in   Mr.  Bliss'  edition  of 
Andrewes,  vol.  vii.  pp.  vii.,  viii.,  xviii.,  xxxvi. 
t  Bliss'  edition,  vii.  pp.  ix.  81. 


LANCELOT  ANDREWES.  65 

oracle  of  learning  ;"  "  the  renowned  Bishop  of  Win- 
chester';" "  the  matchless  Bishop  Andrewes ;"  "  that 
oracle  of  our  present  times" — these  phrases  of  Bishop 
Hall  express  the  admiration  and  reverence  of  his 
contemporaries.  He  was  a  man  in  whom  scholars 
like  Grotius  and  Casaubon  acknowledged  an  erudition 
and  an  enthusiasm  for  wide  and  thorough  knowledge 
akin  to  their  own.  Bacon,  remembering  in  his  day 
of  trouble  his  "  ancient  and  private  acquaintance  " 
with  Andrewes,  who  survived  him  by  a  few  months, 
submitted  his  writings  to  his  friend's  criticism, 
and  took  pleasure  in  unfolding  to  him  the  great  plan 
of  the  '  Instauratio.'  *  Andrewes  was  himself  an 
observer  and  lover  of  Nature.  "He  would  often 
profess  that  to  observe  the  grass,  herbs,  corn,  trees, 
cattle,  earth,  waters,  heavens,  any  of  the  creatures ; 
and  to  contemplate  their  natures,  orders,  qualities, 
virtues,  uses,  &c.,  were  ever  to  him  the  greatest 
mirth,  content  and  recreation  that  could  be,  and  this 
he  held  till  his  dying  day."t  And  he  was  not  only 
an  observer,  but  in  some  departments  an  experimen- 
talist. He  was  one  of  the  few  to  whose  sympathetic 
interest,  as  an  observer  of  Nature,  Bacon  felt  he 
could  confidently  appeal  in  his  physical  investiga- 
tions, and  in  his  daring  attempt  to  put  the  knowledge 
of  Nature  on  a  new  and  sound  basis.     Andrewes  had 


*  Letters  and  Life  of  Bacon,  Spedding,  vii.  371-375. 
t  Isaacson,  p.  vi. ;  Spedding,  Bacon,  iv.  24,  63, 
[king's  coll.]  F 


6Q  MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

also,  iu  an  eminent  degree,  what  was  the  charac- 
teristic  virtue    of    liis    time.      He    was   always  on 
tbe  watch   to   seek  out  the  promise  of  ability  and 
worth  in  the  poor  and  friendless,  and  to  encourage 
by    a    noble    liberality    the    learning    of    others. 
Loaded    with  preferment,  after  the  custom   of  his 
day,  he   turned  his   revenues  to   large  and  public 
uses.     He  selected  poor  scholars  and  helped  them. 
He  was  attentive,  in  a  degree  which  attracted  notice, 
for  it  was  not  common  in  the  bishops  of  the  time,  to 
the  claims   upon  his  purse  of  the  churches,  insti- 
tutions, or  estates  entrusted  to  his  stewardship.     He 
put  his  houses  in  good  repair.     He  discharged  out  of 
his  own  income  debts  which  he  found  hanging  over  a 
school   or  a   hospital.     He   largely   increased  their 
permanent  endowments,  either  by  his  gifts  or  his  good 
husbandry.     Bacon's  thoughts  turned  to  him  as  one 
likely   to  help   towards   the  expense  of  costly   re- 
searches and  experiments.     ^'  He  was  single,"  Bacon 
writes,  "  and  he  was' rich."     And  he  was  one  of  those 
large  givers  who  prefer  in  their  lifetime   to  incur 
the  suspicion  of  parsimony  rather  than  fall  in  with 
the  mere  conventional  fashion  of  munificence  ex- 
pected  from   the   wealthy.*     In   an    age   of   much 
self-seeking,  and  many  unscrupulous  ways  of  getting 
rich,   he   was   acknowledged   and    honoured   as   an 
example  of  genuine  public  spirit  in  his  strict  and 


*  Isaacson,  p.  xiv.  note. 


LANCELOT   ANDREWES.  67 

conscientious  method  of  administration,  in  his  patron- 
age, and  in  an  expenditure  which,  when  the  occasion 
called,  could  be  princely. 

All  evidence  attests  the  loveableness  of  his  nature. 
The  lives  of  scholars,  especially  of  scholars  in  the  days 
of  Andrewes,  have  not  usually  had  much  to  attract 
and  interest  those  who  do  not  share  their  aims  and 
employments.  But  in  the  pictures  which  have  been 
preserved  to  us  of  the  relations  between  friends,  there 
are  few  thins^s  more  charminoj  than  what  is  disclosed 
of  the  effect  produced  by  Andrewes'  character  and 
converse  on  the  illustrious  scholar  who  had  sought  a 
refuge  in  England  from  the  intolerance  and  perse- 
cution, first  of  Geneva  and  then  of  Paris,  Casaubon. 
The  graciousness,  considerateness,  sympathy,  with 
which  Andrewes  first  welcomed  Casaubon,  growing,  as 
the  two  men  came  to  know  each  other  better,  into 
an  affectionate  tenderness,  a  delight  in  one  another's 
company,  not  only  among  their  books  but  in  recrea- 
tion, in  visiting  sights,  in  the  enjoyment  of  the  open 
air,  are  exhibited  in  Casaubon's  letters.  Casaubon's 
able  biographer,  Mr.  Pattison,  no  favourable  judge  of 
Churchmen,  or  of  those  who  spend  their  lives  in  the 
pursuits  to  which  Andrewes  devoted  his,  is  not  insen- 
sible to  the  noble  and  beautiful  friendship  between 
the  two  men,  or  to  the  attractions  and  sweetness 
of  Andrewes'  character.  "  Of  all  those  whose  piety 
was  remarkable  in  that  troubled  age,"  says  another 
discriminating,  though  not  more  lenient  or  friendly 

F  2 


68  MASTEKS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

writer,  Mr.  Gardiner,*  "there  was  none  who  could 
bear  comparison  for  spotlessness  and  purity  of  cha- 
racter with  the  good  and  gentle  Andrewes.  Going 
in  and  out  as  he  did  amongst  the  frivolous  and 
grasping  courtiers  who  gathered  round  the  King,  he 
seemed  to  live  in  a  peculiar  atmosphere  of  holiness, 
which  prevented  him  from  seeing  the  true  nature  of 
the  evil  times  in  which  his  lot  had  fallen."  Perhaps 
in  this  he  was  not  singular.  It  may  be  doubted 
whether  any  of  us  fully  understand  the  true  nature 
of  either  the  good  or  the  evil  of  the  times  in  which 
our  lot  is  cast.  We,  looking  back  to  the  past,  can 
see  much  evil  and  much  good,  that  the  men  of  the 
past  could  not  distinguish  or  recognise  when  it  was 
near  them  and  round  them.  But  it  would  be  v/ell  for 
the  men  of  any  age  if  they  loved  the  good  and  hated 
the  evil  which  they  do  recognise,  with  the  sincerity 
and  single-mindedness  of  Andrewes. 

But  the  best  men  are  under  the  prejudices  and 
delusions  of  their  time,  and  Andrewes  was  no  excep- 
tion. He  was  under  the  prejudices  and  delusions 
which  surrounded  the  thrones  and  the  persons  of  the 
Tudors  and  the  Stuarts,  as  all  were  who  served  them. 
He  is  said  to  have  been  one  of  the  bishops  who 
sanctioned  the  burning  of  the  Arian  Leggat.t  To  us 
this  is  rightly  and  naturally  shocking.     It  was  not 


*  History  of  England,  1603-1616,  ii.  33. 

t  Pattison,  Life  of  Casaubon,  331 ;  and  Gardiner,  ii.  43-45. 


LANCELOT    AN  DEE  WES.  69 

shocking,  bat  necessary  and  right,  to  the  wliole 
religious  workl  of  the  day — to  Archbishop  Abbot, 
who  pressed  it  on  and  canvassed  the  judges  who 
ordered  it — to  the  great  Puritan  party.  It  was  not 
shocking  to  the  Church  historian,  Fuller ;  it  was  not 
shocking  to  Neal,  the  historian  of  the  persecutions  of 
the  Puritans.*  It  is  almost  a  greater  surprise  and 
disappointment  to  find  Andrewes  one  of  the  majority 
in  pronouncing  for  a  divorce  in  the  shameful  Essex 
case,  in  which  the  harsh  and  narrow-minded  Abbot, 
to  his  lasting  honour,  took  the  side  of  right  and 
truth,  though  with  the  feeblest  reasons,  against 
wickedness  and  folly  in  high  places.j  What  blinded 
the  eyes  of  Andrewes  in  a  case  which  to  us  seems  so 
clear,  we  cannot  tell,  for  bis  reasons  for  his  opinion 
are  not  preserved.  Yet  he  was  not  one  who  feared 
the  face  of  man,  even  of  the  King.  But  in  those 
troubled  days,  when  men  were  reaping  the  penalties 
of  the  sin  of  many  generations,  and  when  the  rebound 
from  superstitious  submission  to  the  Pope  had 
created  the  superstitious  faith  in  the  Divine  Right 
of  Kings  as  the  only  counterpoise  to  it,  there  seemed 
to  be  a  fate  which,  in  the  course  of  a  Churchman's 
life,  exacted,  at  one  time  or  other,  the  tribute  of  some 
unworthy  compliance  with  the  caprice  or  the  passions 
of  power;    and  the  superstition  must  have  been  a 


*  Hook,  Life  of  Abbot,  pp.  267-70. 

t  Gardiner,  ii.  92-96 ;  Hook,  Life  of  Abl)ot,  p.  272. 


70  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

strong  one  which  could  exact  it  from  such  a  man  as 
Andrewes  to  such  a  man  as  James. 

But  Andrewes  was  an  important  person  not  so 
much  by  what  he  did, — by  a  policy  and  an  adminis- 
tration,— and  not  so  much  even  by  what  he  wrote,  as 
b}"  w  hat  he  w^as  know^n  to  be,  and  what  he  w^as  known 
to  think  and  hokl  on  the  questions  of  his  day.  Unlike 
Hooker,  who  was  a  writer,  and  a  man  little  seen  in  the 
great  world,  Andrewes  was  by  calliug  a  preacher,  and 
one  who  moved  much  in  society,  and  left  his  mark 
on  it  by  the  qualities  which  tell  on  society, — quickness 
and  brightness  of  parts,  a  ready  and  perfect  command 
over  large  stores  of  knowledge,  the  strength  of  an 
original  and  well-furnished  mind  actins;  throuofh 
rapid  comprehension,  play,  and  nimbleness  of  wit,  and 
with  this  a  sharpness  and  force  of  expression  which 
made  words  remembered.  It  was  this  power  w^hich 
gave  him  his  influence  with  James :  and  it  is  seen  in 
his  Sermons,  of  which  the  outward  form  is  in  curious 
contrast  with  the  substance.  In  matter,  no  sermons 
like  them  had  yet  been  preached  in  the  English 
Church.  If  the  stupendous  facts  of  the  Christian 
Creeds  are  true,  no  attention,  no  thought  is  too  great 
for  tliem ;  and  their  greatness,  their  connections, 
their  harmony,  their  infinite  relations  to  the  system, 
of  God's  government  and  discipline  of  mankind,  and 
to  the  hopes  and  certainties  of  human  life,  are  here 
set  forth  with  a  breadth,  a  subtlety,  a  firmness  of 
touch,  a  sense  of  their  reality,  a  fervour  and  reverence 


LANCELOT   ANDREWES.  71 

of  conviction,  which  have  made  the  Sermons  worthy 
and    fruitful   subjects    of  study    to    English    theo- 
logians.    They  bear  the  marks  of  what  we  know  they 
had,  the  most  careful  meditation,  the  most  unsparing 
pains  in  arrangement  and  working  out.*     But  to  us 
of  this  day,  it  no  doubt  does  surprise  us  to  be  told 
that — as  was  certainly  the  case — they  were  the  most 
popular   and   admired   sermons   of  the    time.     We 
hardly  know  how  far  in  their  present  shape  they  are 
skeletons,  which  were  filled  up  and  illustrated  in  actual 
delivery.     But  a  hearer  of  our  day  would  be  at  once 
overwhelmed  by  the  profusion  and  rush  of  ideas,  and 
disconcerted    by   the   sparseness   of    expansion   and 
development.    The  majestic  and  connected  eloquence 
which  made  Hooker's  style  so  remarkable,  is  abso- 
lutely  wanting.      There  is   depth   of  thought   and 
depth  of  feeling,  fertility,  energy — there  are  passages 
which  disclose  the  imaginative  and  poetic  side  of  a 
rich  and  beautiful  mind.     But  the  style  is  like  the 
notes  of  the  unceremonious  discourse  of  a  very  ani- 
mated and  varied  talker  rather  than  the  composition 
of  a  preacher.     In  its  quaintness,  its  perpetual  and 
unexpected   allusions,  its  oddly   treated   quotations, 
its   abrupt    and    rapid    transitions,    its    fashion   of 
tossing     about    single    words,    it   is    of    the    same 
kind   as   the    style   of  much   of    Bacon's   writings, 
especially    his   speeches.     It   belongs,   in   point   of 


*  Isaacson,  pp.  xxv.,  xxxvi. 


72  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH    THEOLOGY  : 

literary  character,  to  the  age  before  Hooker.  It 
abounds  in  those  quips  and  puns  which  are  the  al- 
most invariable  resource  of  early  humour,  playful 
or  grave ;  in  passages,  too,  of  powerful  irony,  though 
the  form  of  it  sometimes  raises  a  smile.  Bacon, 
indeed,  used  to  send  his  writings  to  Andrewes,  "  to 
mark  whatsoever  should  seem  to  him  either  not 
current  in  the  style,  or  harsh  to  credit  and  opinion,  or 
inconvenient  for  the  person  of  the  writer."  *  Such  a 
style  satisfied  and  pleased  the  day,  though  it  does 
not  satisfy  or  please  us  ;  and  we  wonder,  perhaps,  that 
after  a  different  standard  had  been  set  by  Hooker, 
it  could  be  endured.  But  students  of  English  thought 
and  literature  are  not  deterred  by  the  harsh  fashions 
of  Bacon's  writings,  and  students  of  English  theology 
will  find,  under  the  quaint  form  of  Andrewes'  Sermons, 
enough  to  justify  his  reputation  as  a  divine,  both  in 
his  own  day  and  since. 

I  am  glad  to  recall  some  comments  on  Bishop 
Andrewes'  style,  made  long  ago  by  a  writer  who  has 
since  become  famous,  and  whose  remarkable  gifts  the 
world  learned  in  their  full  extent  only  at  the  moment 
when  illness  has  disabled  for  the  time  one  of  the 
deepest  and  most  original  minds  of  our  time.  "  An- 
drewes," wrote  Dr.  Mozley  in  1842,t  '*has  peculi- 
arities of  style,  partly  belonging  to  his  age  and  partly 


*  Spedding,  Bacon,  iv.  141. 

t  British  Critic,  Jan.  1842,  pp.  173-175. 


LANCELOT   ANDKEWES.  73 

his  own,  wliich  considerably  prejudice  us  against  him 
at  first,  and  to  which,  accustomed  as  we  are  to  so 
much  more  flowing  and  regular  a  way  of  writing,  we 
can  never  quite  reconcile  ourselves ;  but  with  these 
peculiarities  of  his  own,  he  has  also  felicities  of  his 
own,  which  are  displaying  themselves  at  every  step. 
His  theological  explanations  show  the  connection  of 
one  great  doctrine  with  another,  the  bearing  of  one 
great  fact  of  Christianity  upon  another,  with  admir- 
able decision  and  completeness.  He  is  so  quick  and 
varied,  so  dexterous  and  rich  in  his  combinations ; 
he  brings  facts,  types,  prophecies,  and  doctrines  to- 
gether with  such  rapidity ;  groups,  arranges,  system- 
atises,  sets  and  resets  them  with  such  readiness  of 
movement,  that  he  seems  to  have  a  kind  of  ubiquity, 
and  to  be  everywhere  and  in  every  part  of  the  system 
at  the  same  time.  .  .  .  He  has  everything  in  his  head 
at  once  ;  not  in  the  sense  in  which  a  puzzle-headed 
person  may  be  said  to  have,  who  has  everij  idea  con- 
fused in  his  mind  because  he  has  no  one  idea  clear,  but 
like  a  man  who  is  at  once  clear-headed  and  manifold, 
— if  we  may  be  allowed  the  word — in  his  ideas,  who 
can  do  more  than  apprehend  one  point  clearly  or 
many  dimly — can  apprehend,  that  is  to  say,  many 
keenly.  And  this  peculiarity  has  a  good  deal  to 
do  with  the  peculiarity  of  his  style  :  it  is  obviously 
a  natural  one,  and  expresses  the  working  of  his  own 
mind.  He  is  never  longer  in  stating  a  thing  than  he 
can  possibly  help,  because  his  mind  being  always,  as 


74  MASTERS    IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

it  were,  two  or  three  steps  ahead  of  his  pen,  he 
lays  down  the  point  in  passing  on  his  way  to  some- 
thing else,  and  therefore  does  not  apply  himself 
more  to  it  than  is  necessary  in  the  way  of  business ; 
what  he  is  going  to  say,  occupies  him;  what  he 
is  saying,  he  only  says,  and  no  more  .  .  .  His 
sermons,  in  fact,  have  both  the  advantages  and 
disadvantages,  whatever  these  may  be,  of  being 
more  like  very  copious  and  connected  notes  for  dis- 
courses than  discourses  themselves.  They  have 
the  terseness,  freshness,  and  condensation  of  ideas 
first  put  together,  together  with  their  want  of  form 
and  polish ;  though  we  gather  from  Andrewes'  con- 
temporaries, that  the  delivery  made  up  consider- 
ably for  this  deficiency."  And  the  critic  notices 
especially  two  points:  1.  Andrewes'  method  of 
hammering  the  same  idea  into  his  hearers  again 
and  again.  "He  is  never  tired  of  using  the 
same  word.  The  idea,  ever  thus  renewed,  and 
recreated,  as  it  were,  gains  strength  and  power  by 
the  mere  act  of  repetition,  and  each  successive  blow 
comes  down  with  increased  effect : " — And  2.  the 
animation  of  his  discourse.  "Whatever  faults  he 
may  have,  he  never  sleeps — he  is  always  on  the 
move  in  one  direction  or  another.  Incessant  aim 
and  activity  is  the  pervading  characteristic  of  his 
sermons ;  his  shortnesses,  quaintnesses,  his  multiplied 
divisions ;  his  texts  wielded  with  such  dexterity,  and 
ever  at  hand — ever,  as  it  were,  on  service — all  keep 


LANCELOT   ANDKEWES.  75 

up  the  stirring  and  business-like  character  of  the 
scene ;  all  are  at  work  fulfilling  their  various  tasks 
and  parts  in  the  construction  of  the  discourse,  and 
occupying  themselves  like  bees  in  their  hive  : — 

*•  Et  munire  favos  et  dsedala  fingere  tecta."  * 

Merely,  however,  as  a  preacher,  as  a  master,  in 
those  early  days,  of  the  language  and  rhetoric  of  the 
pulpit,  xVndrewes  would  claim  less  interest  than 
Donne ;  for  in  Donne  there  is  not  only  the  matter, 
but  the  not  unsuccessful  effort  after  form  and  art 
which  Andrewes  entirely  neglected.  But  Andrewes 
was  primarily  a  theologian;  and  his  theology  has 
permanently  influenced  the  range  and  character  of 
theological  thought  in  the  English  Church. 

Andrewes'  theological  opinions  were  formed  about 
the  same  time,  and  under  the  same  circumstances,  as 
Hooker's.  The  two  men  had  much  in  common,  both 
in  their  strong  recoil  from  the  popular  traditions 
and  systems  which,  under  Elizabeth,  had  more  and 
more  loudly  claimed  to  interpret  and  represent 
exclusively  the  English  Keformation ;  and  also  in  the 
positive  ground  which  each  was  disposed  to  take,  as 
the  true  and  authentic  basis  of  the  teaching  of  the 
English  Church.  Both,  too,  had  in  common  that 
devotional  temper,  those  keen  and  deep  emotions 
of  a\ve,    reverence   and   delight,  which  arise  when 


British  Critic,  Jan.  1842,  pp.  193,  202. 


76  MASTEES   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

the  objects  of  theological  thought  and  interest 
are  adequately  realised,  according  to  their  great- 
ness, by  the  imagination  and  the  heart.  Hooker 
made  the  first,  at  any  rate  the  most  conspicuous, 
venture  to  cut  across  the  grain  of  public  prejudice. 
But  Hooker,  great  as  he  was — and  the  Englishmen 
of  Shakespeare  and  Bacon's  age  could  not  fail  to 
recognise  his  greatness — was  yet  but  an  obscure 
country  parson,  who  may  be  said  to  have  failed  in 
London,  and  who  certainly  was  not  much  seen  in  the 
houses  of  the  great.  Andrewes  not  only  followed 
for  a  quarter  of  a  century  after  Hooker's  death  in 
the  path  which  Hooker  had  opened,  but  Andrewes 
w^as  the  companion  and  trusted  counsellor  of  the 
holders  of  power.  He  was  one  of  the  greatest  and 
most  considered  men  in  England,  rising  to  the  high 
places,  one  after  another,  of  the  Church ;  in  the 
opinion  of  some  of  the  wisest  observers,  the  only  fit 
man  for  the  highest. 

In  Andrewes,  as  in  Hooker,  we  come  on  a  wide 
divergence  from  the  language  of  the  early  theologians 
of  Elizabeth,  and  from  the  way  in  which  they  pre- 
sented the  relative  importance  and  proportion  of 
different  parts  of  the  doctrinal  system  of  tlie  Church. 
Before  it  is  said  that  this  was  a  departure  from  the 
spirit  of  the  Reformation,  it  ought  to  be  brought 
to  mind  what  the  Reformation  was.  It  was  not  a 
thing  in  all  its  parts  done,  finished,  completed  for 
good.     Part  of  it  was  final — the  independence  of  the 


LANCELOT   ANDREWES.  77 

National  Church,  the  repudiation  of  superstition 
and  corruption ;  part  could  not  be  accomplished 
at  once.  It  started  as  a  progressive  and  tentative 
effort  to  mend  things  which  had  been  long  and 
dee23ly  injured,  to  put  straight  things  which  the 
custom  of  centuries  and  the  ignorance  of  the  day 
had  turned  awry  ;  but  it  looked  on  this  as  a  gradual 
process,  which  it  was  too  much  to  hope  to  see  done 
at  a  stroke,  and  which  was  to  exercise  the  wisdom 
and  patience  of  years  to  come.  It  cannot  be  suffi- 
ciently remembered  that  in  James  I.'s  time,  and  in 
Charles  II.'s  time  in  1662,  the  Eeformation  was  still 
going  on  as  truly  as  it  was  in  the  days  of  Edward 
VI.  and  Elizabeth.  The  English  Eeformation  was, 
theologically  speaking,  one  of  the  most  adventurous 
and  audacious — bravely  audacious — of  enterprises. 
Its  object  was  to  revolutionise  the  practical  system 
of  the  English  Church  without  breaking  with  history 
and  the  past ;  to  give  the  Crown  and  the  State  vast 
and  new  powers  of  correction  and  control,  without 
trenching  on  the  inherited  prerogatives  of  the  spiri- 
tualty ;  and  to  do  this  without  the  advantage  of  a 
clear,  solid,  well-tested,  consistent  theory,  or  else, 
as  in  Luther's  case,  of  a  strong  exaggerated  cry  and 
watchword.  Smarting  under  the  sting  of  monstrous 
practical  abuses,  and  quite  conscious  of  the  im- 
possibility of  making  sudden  changes  to  be  deep  ones, 
the  English  reformers  adopted  what  their  enemies 
might  well  call  a  hand-to-mouth  policy  of  experi- 


78  MASTEKS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  I 

ment  in  finding  what  they  still  hoped  might  be  a 
growing,  improving,  yet  permanent  settlement.  The 
Eoman  theory  of  the  Church,  and  of  Church  reform 
as  pursued  at  Trent,  was  compact  and  complete ; 
the  Calvinist  theory  of  Church  reform  and  Church 
reconstruction  was  equally  logical  and  complete ;  in 
each  case  all  was  linked  together,  consistent,  im- 
pregnable, till  you  came  to  the  final  question  of  the 
authority  on  which  all  rested,  and  till  you  came  to 
square  the  theory  with  certain  and  important  facts. 
With  a  kind  of  gallant  contempt  for  the  protection 
of  a  theory,  we  in  England  shaped  our  measures  as 
well  as  we  could,  to  suit  the  emergencies  whicli  at 
the  moment  most  compelled  the  attention  of  the 
steersman  at  the  helm.  The  English  Eeforma- 
tion  ventured  on  its  tremendous  undertaking,  the 
attempt  to  make  the  Church  theologically,  politically, 
socially  different,  vvhile  keeping  it  historically  and 
essentially  the  same  —  with  what  seems  the  most 
slender  outfit  of  appliances.  Principles  it  had  ;  but 
they  were  very  partially  explored,  applied,  followed 
out  to  consequences,  harmonised,  limited.  It  sprung 
from  an  idea,  a  great  and  solid  one,  even  though  dimly 
comprehended,  but  not  from  a  theory  or  a  system, 
such  as  that  unfolded  in  Calvin's  Institutes.  Its 
public  and  avowed  purpose — I  do  not  say  that  of  all 
its  promoters — but  its  public  purpose  was,  taking  the 
actual  historical  Church  of  Augustine  and  Ethelbert, 
of  Becket  and  Wolsey,  of  Warham  and  Pole,  the 


LANCELOT   ANDREWES.  79 

existing  historical  representative  and  descendant 
of  that  supernatural  Society  which  is  traceable 
through  all  the  ages  to  Apostolic  days,  to  assert  its 
rights,  to  release  it  from  usurpation,  to  purge  away 
the  evils  which  this  usurpation  had  created  and 
fostered ;  and  accepting  the  Bible  as  the  primitive 
Church  liad  accepted  it,  and  trying  to  test  every- 
thing by  Scripture  and  history,  to  meet  the  im- 
mediate necessities  of  a  crisis  which  called  not  only 
for  abolition,  but  for  reconstruction  and  replacement. 
What  was  done  bore  the  marks  of  a  clear  and 
definite  purpose ;  but  it  also  bore  the  unmistakable 
marks  of  haste  and  pressure^  as  well  as  violence. 
Laws, — all  but  the  most  indispensable  ones, — canons, 
synods,  tribunals,  the  adjustment  of  the  differing 
elements  of  its  constitution,  were  adjourned  to  a 
more  convenient  season,  which,  in  fact,  has  never 
arrived.  It  began  with  arrangements  avowedly  pro- 
visional. On  the  great  dogmatic  controversies  of 
the  moment  it  defined  cautiously,  its  critics  said, 
imperfectly :  it  hardly  had  made  up  its  own  mind. 
For  the  systematic  confessions  of  tl.e  Continent,  it 
provided  a  makeshift  in  the  Thirty-nine  Articles,  put 
to  a  use  for  which  they  were  not  originally  designed. 
But  it  did  four  things : — I.  It  maintained  the  Epis- 
copate and  the  Ordinal :  2.  It  put  the  English  Bible 
into  the  hands  of  the  people  :  3.  It  gave  them  the 
English  Book  of  Common  Prayer ;  and  4.  To  bind 
all  together  with  the  necessary  bond  of  authority,  it 


80  MASTEKS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

substituted  boldly  and  confidently,  in  place  of  the 
rejected  authority  of  the  Pope,  the  authority,  equally 
undefined,  of  the  Crown,  presumed  to  be  loyally 
Christian  and  profoundly  religious,  and  always  actiug 
in  concert  with  the  Church  and  its  representatives. 
It  has  been  called  a  Via  Media,  a  compromise.  It  is 
more  true  to  fact  to  say  that  what  was  in  the  thought 
of  those  who  guided  it  under  Henry  VIII.  and 
Elizabeth  was  an  attempt,  genuine  though  rude  and 
rough  and  not  always  successful,  to  look  all  round 
the  subject;  to  embrace  in  one  compass  as  many 
advantages  as  they  could — perhajDS  incompatible 
and  inconsistent  ones — without  much  regard  to  pro- 
ducible and  harmonising  theories:  antiquity  and 
novelty,  control  and  freedom,  ecclesiastical  and  civil 
authority,  the  staid  order  of  a  Church  as  old  as  the 
nation  and  the  vigour  of  a  modern  revolution  of  the 
age  of  the  Kenaissance,  a  very  strong  public  govern- 
ment with  an  equally  strong  private  fervour  and 
enthusiasm  ;  to  stimulate  conscience  and  the  sense  of 
individual  responsibility,  and  yet  to  keep  them  from 
bursting  all  bounds;  to  overthrow  a  vast  ancient 
power,  strong  in  its  very  abuses  and  intrenched 
beliind  the  prejudices  as  well  as  the  great  deeds  of 
centuries,  and  yet  to  save  the  sensitive,  delicate 
instincts  of  loyalty,  reverence,  and  obedience ;  to 
make  room  in  the  same  system  of  teaching  for  the 
venerable  language  of  ancient  Fathers,  and  also  for 
the  new  learning  of  famous  modern  authorities. 


LANCELOT   ANDKEWES.  81 

The  task  was  a  difficult   one,   as   it  was  unique 
among  the  various  projects  opposed  to  it,  or  likened 
to  it,  going  on  at  the  same  time  in  Western  Christen- 
dom.    Abroad,  the  idea  of  the  English  Eeformation 
appeared,   as   it    still   appears  abroad,  an   illogical 
and  incomprehensible  attempt  to  unite  incompatible 
principles  and  elements.     That  government  should 
interfere   with   religion,    should   change    it,   should 
impose  it,  was  perfectly  understood  both  by  Protes- 
tants and  Catholics.    But  that  reformers  in  England, 
having  broken  with  the  Pope,  should  not  make  a 
clear  sweep  of  the  whole  of  the  inherited  system  and 
begin  afresh  ;  that  they  should  embarrass  themselves 
by  maintaining  the  continuity  and  identity  of  the 
existing  Church  with  the  historical  Church  of  the 
past ;  that  they  should  be  so  bold,  yet  so  guarded 
and  reticent, — this  was  unintelligible,  both  at  Eome, 
Paris  and  Madrid,  and  at  Wittenberg,  Jena,  Basle 
and  Geneva.     It  must  have  seemed  to  many, — not 
merely  to  the  worshippers  of  absolute  hypotheses, 
but  to  cool  and  practical  judges  of  the  probabilities  of 
human  affairs — a  very  unpromising,  if  not  forlorn 
and  desperate  venture.     So  daring   a  disregard  of 
obvious  inconsequence  and  anomaly ;  so  delicate  a 
balancing  of  conflicting   tendencies;  so  apparently 
artificial   and   arbitrary   restraints  on  their  natural 
development ;  all,  too,  depending  on  the  chances  of  a 
single  life,  and  the  personal  influence  of  a  character, 
did  not  wear  the  look  of  permanence.    It  might  have 

[king's  coll.]  G 


82  MASTERS   IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

been  plausibly  foretold  that  the  English  reformed 
Church  must  soon  choose  its  side  ;  must  soon  either 
go  backwards  or  forwards ;  backwards  to  its  old 
allegiance ;  forwards  to  the  clear,  definite  position  of 
the  great  Swiss  and  French  reformers.  But  that  it 
should  go  on  strengthening  itself  in  spite  of  its 
double  openness  to  attack,  unfolding  and  developing 
the  energies  of  life  in  spite  of  its  logical  incomplete- 
ness; that  it  should  long  escape  the  dangers  from 
internal  quarrels  and  outward  hostility,  might  well 
have  seemed  one  of  the  most  unlikely  of  supposi- 
tions. The  hopes  and  forecasts  of  the  prophets  of 
evil  may  be  seen  in  the  controversial  literature  of 
the  Koman  advocates,  in  the  pamphlet  literature 
of  the  Puritan  champions  of  the  "  Discipline." 

The  experience  of  three  centuries  has  shown  that 
the  apparently  loose,  ill-jointed,  halting  polity  which 
they  so  contemptuously  criticised,  had  both  a  firmness 
and  an  elasticity  which  more  showy  systems  failed 
in.  It  has  borne  the  brunt  of  time  and  change.  It 
has  never  lost  its  original  informing,  animating  idea. 
It  has  shown  a  wonderful  power  of  obstinate  tenacity 
against  jars  and  shocks,  a  force  of  continuous  growth, 
and  of  vigorous  recovery  after  disaster  and  stagna- 
tion. It  has  certainly  vindicated  its  claim  to  life  and 
reality.  But  at  starting,  the  dangers  were  indeed  for- 
midable. In  the  first  place,  the  principle  of  authority 
had  been  most  rudely  shaken  ;  yet  it  was  necessary 
to  invoke  it  at  every  turn.     It  is  not  easy  for  us  to 


LANCELOT   ANDREWES.  83 

realise  tlie  effect  of  the  slmttering,  in  an  ignorant, 
yet  eager  and  excited  age,  of  tbe  religious  authority 
of  the  Pope.  It  seemed  to  leave  a  void  in  the 
public  control  of  belief  and  conscience  which  every 
one  might  fill  as  he  pleased.  Yet  the  world  had 
been  accustomed  to  authority,  and  the  void  could 
not  be  left  unoccupied.  The  Crown,  its  ministers 
and  its  council ;  the  Bishops,  its  trusted  advisers ;  in 
those  days  in  a  less  prominent,  but  still  important 
degree,  the  Parliament  and  the  Synod,  slipped  into 
the  vacant  place.  But  though  authority  maintained 
itself,  it  did  not  maintain  itself  easily.  The  subtle, 
intangible,  yet  deep  and  mighty  force  of  moral 
authority  which  had  existed  of  old,  and  which  tlie 
Popes  had  strained  till  it  broke,  had  not  been,  could 
not  be,  replaced.  As  a  substitute  for  it,  came  in  an 
exaggerated  idea  of  the  divine  and  personal  rights 
of  the  Crown.  It  was  partly  a  very  real  and  natural 
idea  at  the  time ;  it  was  partly  a  factitious  and 
scholastic  one ;  it  partly  expressed,  vaguely  and 
imperfectly,  the  claims  of  public  law.  But  it  served 
to  consecrate  the  force  which  was  judged  necessary  to 
maintain  what  had  been  settled  as  the  order  of  the 
Church ;  and  the  temptation  to  appeal  to  it,  when- 
ever its  countenance  could  be  hoped  for,  became  on 
all  hands,  irresistible,  where,  as  it  seemed,  time  and 
patience  and  argument,  and  the  growth  of  reasonable 
and  sober  opinion,  could  not  be  w^aited  for  or  relied 
upon.     The  result  was  the  unquestionable  harshness 

G  2 


84  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

of  the  Tudor  and  Stuart  ecclesiastical  government, 
and  the  ever-renewed  exasperation  and  bitterness 
of  its  unruly  subjects,  whom  we  see  to  have  been 
self-willed  and  unreasonable,  but  who  then  thought, 
not  unnaturally,  that  its  authority  had  no  claim  to 
their  respect  nor  binding  force  on  their  consciences. 
And  with  this  impaired  sense  of  authority  at 
home  the  English  Keformation  had  to  confront  the 
mightiest,  the  most  imperious  and  exacting  authority 
outside,  which  ever  claimed  and  bore  a  universal 
sway  over  human  conscience.  It  had  to  confront 
the  Koman  authority,  now  turned  into  the  most  im- 
placable and  aggressive  of  deadly  enemies ;  and  this, 
not  simply  on  the  ground  of  argument  and  influence, 
but  in  the  field  of  political  action.  The  struggle 
between  England  and  Kome  under  Elizabeth,  and  in 
the  first  years  of  James,  was  a  struggle  of  life  and 
death.  It  was  a  struggle,  begun  in  its  desperate 
and  murderous  fierceness  by  the  Popes,  in  which  no 
scruples  were  felt,  no  terms  kept  on  either  side. 
Controversy,  never  silent,  and  always  truculent  and 
unsparing,  was  but  a  light  matter  compared  with 
the  terrible  hostilities  carried  on,  not  by  word,  but 
by  deed ;  war  and  conspiracy  and  massacre,  the 
fanaticism  of  assassination  and  treason,  met  by  san- 
guinary legislation,  by  cold  and  determined  "  exe- 
cution of  justice."  We  may  well  be  aghast  at  the 
horrors  of  that  struggle.  The  deep  hatreds  and 
deep   injuries   of  the  political  conflict  gave  to  the 


LANCELOT   AXDREWES.  85 

theological  controversy — the  necessary  theological 
controversy — an  unfairness  and  a  virulence  from 
which  it  has  never  recovered,  and  which  have  been 
a  disgrace  to  Christendom,  and  fatal,  not  merely  to 
unity,  but  in  many  ways  to  truth.  But  there  was 
something  more  on  the  Eoman  side  than  the  cruel 
intrigues  of  Popes  and  Jesuits  and  the  brutality 
of  pamphleteers.  Since  the  age  of  Julius  II.  and 
Leo  X.,  and  the  first  sittings  of  the  Council  of  Trent, 
Boman  controversy  had  become  intellectually  much 
more  formidable.  The  stress  of  the  Eeformation  had 
forced  it  to  look  narrowly  into  its  own  case  and  its 
grounds.  Against  the  learning  of  Erasmus  and  the 
o^enius  and  thousfht  of  Cah*in,  it  felt  the  necessity 
of  something  more  than  the  stock  arguments  and 
quotations  of  its  earlier  defenders,  Eck  and  Caietan. 
And  the  result  was  remarkable.  The  order  of  the 
Jesuits  arose  to  place,  not  merely  enthusiasm  and 
political  unscrupulousness  at  the  service  of  the  Pope, 
but  learning,  the  spirit  of  research,  intellectual  acti- 
vity and  literary  skill.  Vast  scientific  systems  of 
theology,  like  the  great  work  of  Suarez,  unfolded  and 
established  with  philosophic  calmness  and  strength 
the  Roman  doctrine.  To  match  such  works  as  these 
there  was  nothing — I  do  not  say  in  England,  but  even 
in  Germany  and  Switzerland.  There  was  nothincr 
to  match  the  subtlety  and  comprehensiveness  of  the 
"  Controversies  "  of  Bellarmine.  There  was  nothing 
to  match  the  imposing  historical  picture  presented 


86  MASTEES   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

in  the  annals  of  Baronius.  Konie  had  mucli  more 
to  say  for  itself  than  had  appeared  to  Cranmer  or 
even  to  Jewell. 

There  was  a  third  danger.  The  foreign  Reforma- 
tion, in  its  most  vigorous  and  intellectual  re- 
presentatives, undoubtedly  the  French  and  Swiss 
reformers,  started  with  an  imposing  breadth  and 
simplicity  of  principle,  absolute  and  sweeping,  to 
which  the  English  laid  no  claim.  Calvin  and 
Zwingli,  both  in  what  they  destroyed  and  what  they 
built  up,  had  no  occasion  for  the  qualifications,  the 
hesitations,  the  revisions  and  amendments  and  cor- 
rections, which  abound  in  the  course  pursued  in 
England.  But,  as  is  according  to  the  nature  of 
Englishmen,  many  Englishmen  who  were  brought 
into  close  contact  with  the  keen  and  powerful  minds 
who  swayed  the  Reformation  abroad,  were  deeply 
impressed  and  attracted  by  them.  Through  them 
the  opinions  of  the  foreigners,  recommended  by  their 
extreme  and  uncompromising  logic,  found  a  footing  in 
England.  Geneva  and  Zurich  became  rival  centres  of 
influence  to  Rome ;  and  a  school  was  founded,  strong 
from  the  first,  and  always,  either  in  the  government 
or  in  opposition  to  it,  energetic  and  determined,  whose 
object  was  to  carry  change  in  the  English  Church, 
both  in  doctrine,  usages,  and  discipline,  to  a  point 
where  all  likeness  was  lost,  not  only  to  the  unre- 
formed  but  to  the  ancient  Church.  It  became  their 
steady,  persevering  policy  to  impose  the  Calvinistic 


LANCELOT   ANDREWES.  87 

tlieology  iu  its  severest  form  as  regards  the  Divine 
decrees  as  well  as  the  doctrines  of  grace,  both  as  an 
authoritative  and  as  a  popular  system  of  teaching, 
on  the  documents  and  on  the  organs  of  the  English 
Church;  and  to  disparage  and  intimidate  with  the 
note  of  disloyalty  and  treason  any  departure  from 
the  definitions  and  phraseology  of  the  great  foreign 
divines,  who  in  those  days  were  supposed  to  be  in 
exclusive  and  certain  possession  of  the  interpretation 
of  revealed  truth.  Calvinism,  transplanted  into  the 
serious  and  earnest  nature  of  Englishmen  and  Scotch- 
men, flourished  with  a  vigour  of  life  which  it  rapidly 
lost  in  its  native  seats.  How  nearly  it  succeeded  in 
making  itself  master  in  the  English  Church  is  seen 
in  the  history  and  language  of  Hooker's  books,  and 
in  Whitgift's  'Lambeth  Articles'  of  1595.  And 
viith.  the  imperious  and  exclusive  demand  of  the 
Calvinistic  theology  had  also  come  other  claims. 
That  early  fraternisation  with  the  foreign  reformers 
in  the  first  stage  of  our  own  Keformation,  natural, 
inevitable,  excusable  as  under  the  difficulties  of  the 
time  it  may  have  been, — that  wholesale  acceptance 
of  their  authority,  and  that  deference  to  the  judgment 
of  their  disciples,  which  gave  even  to  John  Knox  a 
part  in  the  theological  language  of  Edward's  second 
Prayer-Book,*  furnished  a  ground  for  claiming  that 


*  See  Dr.  Lorimer's  'John  Knox  and  the  Church  of  England, 
chap.  iii. 


88  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

the  English  Keformed  Church  should  go  on  to  full 
conformity  with  the  ecclesiastical  doctrines  of  the 
great  foreign  masters.  The  only  safeguard  for  their 
theology  was  the  full  acceptance  of  their  Church 
"  platform : "  the  one  was  as  much  of  Divine  au- 
thority as  the  other.  We  have  no  right  to  wonder 
that  this  party  aimed  high.  They  aimed  at  nothing 
less  than  what  they  afterwards  carried — not  a  mere 
change  in  this  or  that  point,  but  a  substitution  of  an 
entirely  new  polity  and  constitution  for  the  existing 
one, — of  an  entirely  new  idea  of  the  Church  for  that 
on  which  the  Reformation  in  England  had  been 
based.  Toleration  was  then  on  all  sides  not  merely 
unacknowledged  but  condemned.  The  demand  of 
the  Puritan  was  that  nothins^  should  be  allowed  but 
Puritanism. 

Through  these  trials  the  English  Eeformation  had 
to  make  its  way.  In  Bishop  Andrewes,  as  in  Hooker, 
we  see  the  pass  to  which  things  had  come; — the 
pressure  of  the  hostile  forces ;  the  vulnerable  points 
on  w^hich  they  bore  heavily ;  the  awakening  in  the 
Church  of  wider  knowledge,  of  freedom  and  inde- 
pendence of  thought,  of  calmer  and  steadier  judg- 
ment ;  and  the  effort  of  reviving  intellectual  power, 
after  the  haste  and  hurried  confusion  of  the  early 
practical  struggles  for  reformation,  not,  indeed,  to 
construct  a  theory  for  it,  but  to  put  what  it  had 
done,  and  what  it  aimed  at  doing,  on  a  reasonable 
and  tenable  ground.     The  later  years  of  Elizabeth, 


LANCELOT   ANDREWES.  89 

which,  in  spite  of  their  troubles,  were  settled  and 
quiet  compared  Avith  the  beginning  of  the  century, 
cleared  up  much  that  had  been  confused  and  un- 
certain. The  larger  and  richer  and  more  powerful 
minds  had  time  to  think,  to  learn,  to  balance,  to 
weigh  and  analyse  arguments,  to  follow  out  conse- 
quences. The  English  Church,  at  its  Keformation, 
had  taken  up  its  ground  on  the  Scriptures  and  the 
Primitive  Church.  It  had  avowed  its  object  to  be 
a  return,  as  far  as  was  possible,  to  what  the  teaching 
of  the  Apostles  and  their  disciples  had  made  the 
Primitive  Church  to  be.  At  the  outset,  all  that  was 
much  insisted  upon  was  that  the  Primitive  Church 
was  certainly  not  like  the  modern  unreformed  Latin 
Church.  By  the  end  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  men  had 
found  leisure  to  inquire  carefully  and  honestly,  with 
less  prejudice  and  heat,  what  that  model  was  like, 
w4iich  the  Eoglish  Church  had  declared  its  wish  to 
copy  in  all  things  essential.  Arms  were  still  needed, 
as  much  as  ever,  against  the  never-ceasing  hostility 
of  Rome :  but  something  more  was  clearly  necessary 
than  the  mere  negations  of  earlier  controversy  and 
invectives  against  Eoman  corruption  and  preten- 
sions ;  some  more  positive  ground  on  which  to  rest 
the  claim  that  England  was  better  and  more  primi- 
tive than  Rome.  Such  a  ground  it  was  not  easy  to 
find  in  that  narrow  Calvinism  which  the  Puritans 
were  trying  to  force  on  the  Government,  and  to 
make  the  popular  religion  of  the  country.     Some- 


90  MASTERS   IN  ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

thing  was  wanted  broader,  more  intelligible,  and 
more  refined  than  their  mode  of  presenting  the 
ideas  of  justification  and  God's  predestinating  and 
electing  grace,  and  their  fashion  of  summing  up 
loyalty  to  Christ  and  truth  in  petty  scruples  about 
innocent  and  natural  usages  and  ceremonies.  Some- 
thing was  wanted,  as  fervent,  but  more  true,  more 
noble,  more  Catholic,  than  their  devotion  and  self- 
discipline.  The  higher  spirits  of  the  time  wanted  to 
breathe  more  freely,  and  in  a  purer  air.  They  found 
what  they  wanted  in  the  language,  the  ideas,  the 
tone  and  temper  of  the  best  early  Christian  litera- 
ture. That  turned  their  thoughts  from  words  to  a 
Person.  It  raised  them  from  the  disputes  of  local 
cliques  to  the  ideas  which  have  made  the  Universal 
Church.  It  recalled  them  from  arguments  that 
revolved  round  a  certain  number  of  traditional 
formulsB  about  justiflcation,  free-will,  and  faith,  to  a 
truer  and  worthier  idea  both  of  man  and  God,  to  the 
overwhelming  revelation  of  the  Word  Incarnate,  and 
the  result  of  it  on  the  moral  standard  and  behaviour 
of  real  and  living  men.  It  led  them  from  a 
theology  which  ended  in  cross-grained  and  perverse 
conscientiousness,  to  a  theology  which  ended  in 
adoration,  self-surrender,  and  blessing,  and  in  the  awe 
and  joy  of  welcoming  the  Presence  of  the  Eternal 
Beauty,  the  Eternal  Sanctity,  and  the  Eternal  Love, 
the  Sacrifice  and  Keconciliation  of  the  World. 

Andre wes,  by  nature  and  choice,  an  indefatigable 


LANCELOT   ANDREWES.  91 

student,  a  ready  and  accomplished  teacher,  a  devout 
and  self-disciplined  seeker  after  a  life  with  God,  was 
only  by  necessity  a  polemic.  There  was  abundance  in 
the  world  of  his  time  to  disquiet  and  offend  him ; — to 
offend  his  large  knowledge,  his  idea  of  religion,  his 
convictions  of  the  sacredness  of  morality,  his  balanced 
reason ;  to  disquiet  him,  as  to  the  result  of  the  mis- 
chievous elements  working  round  English  religion. 
But  only  in  one  direction  did  he  throw  himself 
avowedly  into  controversy.  He  threw  himself  into 
it  as  an  Englishman,  as  a  servant  of  his  country  and 
King,  as  well  as  a  Churchman.  The  great  Eoman 
rally,  whicli  dated  from  the  institution  of  the  Com- 
pany of  Jesus,  and  which  had  been  growing  in 
strength  and  uncompromising  aggression  through 
the  sixteenth  century,  had  given  a  pressing  and 
menacing  importance  to  the  Eoman  controversy  in 
England.  For  the  Eoman  claims  called  in  question 
not  simply  the  foundations  of  the  English  Church, 
but  the  foundations  of  the  English  State  and  society. 
The  prominence  given  to  the  revived  doctrine  of 
the  deposing  power  had  received  meaning  not  only 
from  what  had  been  attempted  in  England,  but  by 
what  had  been  accomplished,  avowed,  celebrated  in 
France.  We  sometimes  speak  as  if  the  crimes  of 
the  Eoman  party  culminated  in  the  massacre  of 
St.  Bartholomew  and  the  cruelties  of  Alva.  But 
besides  that  these,  unhappily,  had  a  terrible  balance 
on  the  other  side,  they  were  not  the  worst.     It  is  in 


92  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH    THEOLOGY: 

the  French  wars  of  the  League,  in  the  principles 
invented  by  their  ecclesiastical  leaders,  proclaimed 
in  the  pulpits  of  Paris,  spread  abroad  by  a  thou- 
sand emissaries,  put  in  practice  by  the  assassins  of 
Henry  III.  and  Henry  IV.,  that  we  see  the  real 
character  of  theories  put  forth  by  great  and  popular 
champions  of  Rome,  and  their  fatal  bearing  on  the 
primary  conditions  of  human  society.  The  murder 
of  Henry  lY.  drove  the  calm  and  impartial  Casaubon 
to  say,  "  that  he  thought  it  now  part  of  his  religion 
to  make  public  profession  of  his  belief  in  the  Eoyal 
Supremacy."  The  sense  of  these  dangers,  indignation 
at  the  atrocious  wickedness  and  profanations  which 
marked  tlie  policy  now  so  highly  in  favour  at  Eome, 
the  wrath  of  a  man  of  learninsf  at  the  otoss  abuse  of 
learning  for  the  support  of  sophistry,  which  in  the 
cause  of  reckless  ambition  ended  in  perjury  and 
murder,  forced  Andrewes  reluctantly,  but  very  reso- 
lutely, into  this  barren  and  dreary  field.  James 
claimed  the  aid  of  his  learning  and  keen  wit  against 
the  foremost  leaders  of  the  Roman  claims,  Bellarmine 
and  Duperron.  The  gossips  of  the  Court  record  that 
controversy  was  neither  to  his  liking  nor  according 
to  his  supposed  aptitudes ;  but  they  also  record  with 
what  power  he  accomplished  his  task.*  He  met  his 
opponents  on  ground  new  to  them.  He  met  them  as 
a   man   at  least  as  deeply  learned  in  ecclesiastical 


*  Vide  Note  ia  Bliss'  ed.  of  Andrewes,  vii.,  pp.  ix.,  x. 


LANCELOT   ANDREWES.  93 

history  and  literature  as  themselves.  One  of  the 
triumphant  devices  of  the  later  Eoman  argument 
had  been  to  take  the  English  Church  at  her  word, 
as  a  Church  wliich  avowedly  aimed  at  making  the 
ancient  Church  her  standard,  and  to  contrast  this 
with  the  dogmas  and  the  "platform"  too  hastily 
adopted  from  Geneva  by  some  of  her  divines  in  the 
reaction  against  the  intolerable  abuses  of  the  days 
of  Leo  X.  Andrewes  gave  a  new  turn  to  the  con- 
troversy. He  was  not  afraid  of  what  was  genuine 
early  language  and  early  usage.  When  Cardinal 
Duperron  drew  a  detailed  comparison  between  the 
Church  of  St.  xiTigustine  and  of  the  four  first 
Councils,  and  the  Churches  of  his  day,  Roman  and 
Eeformed,  and  asked  which  of  the  latter  bore  the 
greater  resemblance  to  the  earlier  type,  Andrewes 
fearlessly  met  the  challenge,  on  behalf  of  the  Church 
of  England.  The  challenge  v/as,  indeed,  a  fallacious 
one,  from  the  vast  changes  which  had  passed  over 
the  world,  and  from  the  enormous  differences  be- 
tween the  5th  and  the  17th  centuries,  which  one 
side  as  much  as  the  other  had  to  take  account  of. 
Yet  there  were  times,  doubtless,  in  the  history  of 
the  Reformation  when  it  would  have  been  hazardous 
to  have  met  such  a  challenge  before  those  acquainted 
with  history.  But  Andrewes  wrote  with  the  advan- 
tage which  enlarged  knowledge  and  experience  had 
thrown  on  the  aims  and  language  of  both  sides  in 
the  struggle  ;  and  he  did  not  shrink  from  clciimin2: 


94  MASTEKS   IN    ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

for  his  Church  as  large  and  essential  a  conformity 
with  antiquity,  even  in  outward  tilings,  as  could  be 
pretended  by  Eome,  and  a  far  deeper  agreement 
in  spirit. 

With  the  Puritans  he  did  not  enter  so  much  into 
direct  controversy  as  Hooker  had  done.  With  the 
exception  of  some  partial  and  incidental  disputes 
with  individuals — such  as  his  correspondence  with 
Du  Moulin, — or  a  passing  touch  of  rebuke,  protest, 
or  humorous  satire  in  his  preaching,  his  resistance 
to  Puritanism  was  an  indirect  one.  He  looked  for 
producing  his  effect  on  the  tone  and  course  of  reli- 
gious thought  in  England,  not  by  arguing,  but  by 
presenting  uncontroversially  the  reasonableness  and 
the  attractions  of  a  larger,  freer,  nobler,  more  gene- 
rous, may  I  say,  more  imaginative,  system  of  teach- 
ing. His  administrative  weight  as  a  Bishop  was, 
of  course,  thrown  on  the  side  which  resisted  the 
tyrannous  narrowness  of  Puritanism,  and  aimed  at 
greater  expansiveness  and  proportion  in  doctrine, 
and  dignity  and  solemnity  in  worship.  But  he  did 
not  trust  to  administration  and  power  as  Laud  did. 
The  weapon  by  which  he  attacked  Puritanism,  the 
instrument  by  which  he  endeayoured  to  enlai-ge  the 
sympathies  and  refine  the  religious  ideas  of  his  day, 
was  his  sermons.  In  those  sermons — belonmn":  as 
they  do  in  style  and  manner  to  their  time — 
there  is  a  clear  and  strong  contrast  with  the  way 
in  which   Christianity   had  usually  been  presented 


LANCELOT  ANDREWES.  95 

in  the  preaching  of  the  previous  generation.  This 
preaching  professed  to  represent  the  original  creed 
of  Calvinism — stern,  hard,  positive,  but  thoroughly- 
earnest  and  very  mighty — and  with  a  gloomy 
and  savage  grandeur  and  nobility,  in  its  pas- 
sionate loyal  assertions  of  the  irresistible  Sove- 
reignty of  God,  against  the  claims,  the  worthless- 
ness,  and  the  insignificance  of  man.  But  this  stem 
creed,  for  a  short  moment  a  living  one,  had,  as  was 
sure  to  be  the  case,  degenerated  into  a  dry,  unreal, 
stereotyped  scholasticism,  to  which  the  mediaeval 
scholasticism  was  fruitful  and  interesting.  In  An- 
drewes  you  feel  as  if  he  had  broken  bounds.  You 
see  at  once  a  wider  horizon,  objects  of  faith  and 
contemplation  at  once  more  real,  more  personal, 
more  august ;  you  become  aware  of  your  relation  to 
a  vaster  and  more  diversified  world,  a  world  full  of 
mystery,  yet  touching  you  on  every  side.  Doctrine 
you  have,  dogmatic  teaching  as  precise  and  emphatic 
as  anywhere :  but  it  is  doctrine  as  wide  as  the  Scrip- 
ture in  its  comprehensiveness  and  variety,  reflecting 
at  every  turn  the  unutterable  and  overwhelming  won- 
ders which  rise  before  us  when  we  think  of  ^vhat  we 
mean  by  the  Creeds ;  corresponding  in  its  dignity,  in 
its  versatile  application,  to  the  real  history  of  man, 
to  the  deep  and  manifold  wants  of  the  soul,  its  aspira- 
tions, its  terrible  sins,  its  cruel  fears,  its  capacities 
for  hope  and  delight,  the  strange  fortunes  of  the 
race,  and  of  the  story  of  each  individual  life.     He  is 


96 


MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY; 


not  a  mere  moralist,  not  simply  a  preacher  of  high 
duties  and  elevated  views  of  human  nature  and  pros- 
pects.* He  is,  first  and  foremost,  a  theologian,  whose 
deepest  belief  is  the  importance  of  his  theology, 
and  who  profoundly  reverences  its  truth.  But  his 
theology  is  very  different  from  that  so  long  in  vogue. 
It  approached  man  on  his  many  sides.  It  was  in- 
stinct with  the  awful  consciousness  of  our  immense 
and  hopeless  ignorance  of  the  ways  and  counsels  of 
God — with  that  shrinking  from  speculation  on  the 
secret  things  of  the  Most  High  which  he  shared 
with  Hooker,  and  which  as  a  professed  law  of  divinity 
was  something  new  in  the  theological  world  of  the 
day.  "  For  these  sixteen  years,  since  I  was  ordained 
priest,"  he  says,  in  his  judgment  on  the  *  Lambeth 


*  "  Since  the  Kevolution  of 
1688  our  Church  has  been  chilled 
and  starved  too  generally  by 
preachers  and  reasoners,  Stoic 
or  Epicurean  :  first,  a  sort  of 
pagan  morality  was  substituted 
for  righteousness  by  faith ;  and 
latterly  prudence,  or  Paleyanism, 
has  been  substituted  even  for 
morality.  A  Christian  preacher 
ought  to  preach  Christ  alone,  and 
all  things  in  Him  and  by  Him. 
If  he  find  a  dearth  in  this,  if  it 
seem  to  him  a  circumscription, 
he  does  not  know  Christ  as  the 
^leroma,  the  fulness.  It  is  not 
possible  that  there  should  be 
aught  true,  or  seemly,  or  beau- 


tiful, in  thought,  will,  or  deed, 
speculative  or  practical,  which 
may  not,  and  which  ought  not, 
to  be  evolved  out  of  Christ  and 
the  faith  in  Christ ;  no  folly, 
no  error,  no  evil  to  be  exposed, 
or  warned  against,  which  may 
not,  and  should  not,  be  convicted 
and  denounced  for  its  contrari- 
ancy  and  enmity  to  Christ.  To 
the  Christian  preacher,  Christ 
should  be  in  all  things,  and  all 
things  in  Christ :  he  should  ab- 
jure every  argument  which  is 
not  a  link  in  the  chain,  of  which 
Christ  is  the  staple  and  staple- 
ring."  (Coleridge,  '  Notes  on 
English  Divines :  Donne,'  i.  8Q.) 


LANCELOT   AXDEEWES.  97 

Articles,'  "  I  have  never  publicly  or  privately  dis- 
puted or  preached  on  these  mysteries  of  predestiua- 
tion  " — on  which  every  one  else  was  disputing ;  "  and 
now  I  would  much  rather  hear  than  speak  of  them."* 
His  aim  was  to  give  accuracy  and  breadth  to  dogma, 
and  to  put  life  in  its  expression,  as  St.  Augustine,  St. 
Chrysostom,  and  the  great  Greek  Fathers  had  done : 
not  to  plunge  into  the  abysses  of  the  unknown,  and  ot* 
that  which  it  is  impossible  to  know,  but  to  fix  thought 
on  the  certainties  and  realities,  passing  all  wonder, 
that  we  believe  are  known,  and  to  accompany  their 
contemplation  with  that  encompassing  train  of  Chris- 
tian affections  and  graces,  without  which  they  have 
been  revealed  in  vain — faith,  and  reverence,  and 
high  hope,  and  the  desire  after  holiness,  and  humble 
patience,  and  the  joy  of  God's  love.  The  power  of  Puri- 
tanism was  now  no  longer  in  its  scheme  of  doctrine, 
but  in  its  fierce  Judaical  hatreds,  which,  natural  at 
one  time  against  intolerable  superstitions,  had  passed 
into  a  superstition  as  intolerable  and  mischievous. 
How  best  to  fight  against  the  blind  powers  of  igno- 
rance and  prejudice,  when  they  have  been  unloosened, 
and  aspire  to  govern  churches  and  direct  religion,  is 
always  an  anxious  question.  Andrewes  conceived  that 
the  most  hopeful  way  was  to  spend  his  life  and  gifts 
in  presenting  continually  in  the  pulpit  the  counter- 
attraction  of  a  purer  and  nobler  pattern  of  faith :  a 


*  AuJi-ewes,  '  Minor  Worb^,'  294. 

[king's  coll.] 


98  MASTERS    IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

religion  with  vaster  prospects  and  wider  sympathies  ; 
which  claimed  kindred  with  all  that  Nvas  ancient,  and 
all  that  was  universal  in  Christianity ;  wliich  looked 
above  the  controversies  and  misunderstandings  of 
the  hour,  to  the  larger  thought,  and  livelier  faith, 
and  sanctified  genius  of  those  in  whom  the  Church 
of  Christ  has  recognised  her  most  venerated  teachers. 
His  efforts  failed  at  the  time.  Probably  they  would 
have  failed  equally,  in  spite  of  Clarendon's  opinion 
the  other  way,  if  he  had  been  called  to  succeed 
Abbot  at  Canterbury.*  That  unqualified  idea  of 
Koyal  power,  the  ruin  of  Spain  and  France,  in  which 
Churchmen  of  that  day  put  their  trust,  and  to  which 
their  opponents  would  equally  have  trusted  if  they 
could  have  got  it  on  their  side,  was  a  doomed  one  in 
England,  and  must  have  brought  defeat  for  the  time 
on  all  who  had  identified  themselves  with  it.  Puri- 
tanism failing,  first  under  Elizabeth  and  then  under 
James,  to  get  hold  of  the  government,  as  it  once  hoped 
to  do,  had  thrown  itself  into  the  struggle  for  English 
liberty,  and  for  the  moment  it  was  to  reap  the 
reward  of  its  courage.  And  it  must,  I  fear,  be  added 
that  xindrewes  or  any  one  else  would  have  been 
greatly  hampered  by  the  badness  of  his  own  party. 
There  were  sycophants  and  corrupt  trucklers  to 
power  among  the  bishops :  there  was  ignorance  and 
there  was  sordid  greed  among  the  clergy.     "Quis 


Clarendon,  Hist,  of  the  Eebellion,  i.  157. 


LxVXCELOT    ANDRE  WES.  99 

custodiet  ipsos  custocles  ?"  he  ask^;,  in  liis  stem  and 
menacing  Latin  Sermon  at  St.  Paul's,  before  the  Con- 
vocation of  1593.     The  rulers  of  the  Church  did  not 
come  with  clean  hands  to  repress  the  extravagances 
of  Puritan  prophecyings  and  consistories,  and  the  in- 
solence of  Puritan  pamphleteers.  What  Andre wes  did 
was  less  for  his  own  generation  than  for  those  that 
came  after.    In  the  course  of  a  long  and  active  life,  he 
broke  the  yoke  of  prejudice,  and  unloosed  the  tongue 
of  English  theologians.     Without  departing  from  the 
position  or  the  lines  of  the  original  Eeformation,  he 
greatly  enlarged  its  field  of  teacliing.     In  the  out- 
skirts and  fringes  of  its  system,  where  it  bad  been 
characteristically  reticent,  he  was  not  afraid  to  sup- 
ply from  the  authorities,  to  which  it  had  all  along 
appealed,  what  was  wanting  to  complete  tlie  harmony 
and  fulness  of  its  doctrine.     Thus  with  respect  to  the 
idea  of  the  Christian  Sacrifice  in  the  Eucharist,  on 
which  the  language  of  the  ancient  Church  was  so 
clear  and  strong,  and  on  which,  from  the  superstitions 
and  errors   of  the   Mediajval  Church,  the  English 
Prayer    Book   was   so   reserved,  Andrewes,  without 
hesitation  and   as  of  full  right,  recurred,    both  in 
controversy  and  in  teaching,  to  the  language  of  the 
Liturgies,  familiar  to  the  early  writers  from  Irenaeus 
to  Augustine.     So  again,  in  respect  of  those  forms 
and  offices  for  special  occasions  not  provided  for  in 
the   general   office- book   of  the  Church,  he   threw 
himself,  as  an  ancient  Bishop  would  have  done,  on 

H  2 


100  MASTERS   IN    ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

bis  inherent  episcopal  authority  to  supply  the  want. 
It  is  mainly  according  to  the  model  used  by  him  that 
our  churches  are  even  to  this  day  consecrated.  Full 
of  discrimination  for  what  really  had  the  authority 
of  the  ancient  Church,  he  was  the  most  fearless  of 
English  divines,  when  he  had  that  authority.  English 
theology  would  be  in  danger  of  being  much  less 
Catholic,  much  more  disconnected  with  that  of  the 
earlier  ages,  much  more  arbitrarily  limited  in  all 
directions,  except  towards  Geneva  or  else  towards 
simple  latitude,  but  that  a  man  of  Andre wes'  cha- 
racter and  weight  had  dared  to  break  through  the 
prescription  which  the  Puritans  were  trying  to  estab- 
lish against  the  doctrinal  language,  at  once  more 
accurate  and  more  free,  of  the  ancient  Church. 
Without  him  and  his  school,  we  might  perhaps  have 
had  Hales  of  Eton,  and  Chillingworth  and  Tillotson, 
great  and  weighty  names ;  and  on  the  other  hand, 
John  Newton  and  Toplady  and  Thomas  Scott ;  but 
we  could  not  have  had  Jeremy  Taylor  and  Bull, 
and  hardly  Waterland. 

But  Bishop  Andrewes  has  left  behind  him  some- 
thing which,  even  more  than  his  preaching,  explains 
his  influence ;  it  is  the  evidence  of  that  power  of 
character  which  has  so  strong,  though  so  indirect  and 
subtle  a  hold  on  men.  He  is  one  of  those  who  like  St. 
Augustine  have  left  us,  besides  their  writings,  their 
very  secret  selves,  as  they  placed  themselves  in  the 
presence  of    their   God    and   Saviour.      In   Bishop 


LANCELOT   AXDEEWES.  101 

Andrewes'  case  this  was  certainly  without  intending 
it.  After  his  death  was  found  the  book  in  which  he 
had  consigned  the  words  selected  by  him  to  express 
the  usual  attitude  of  his  soul  in  private,  his  usual  feel- 
ings and  emotions,  his  usual  desires,  when  upon  his 
knees.  The  book  has  been  long  familiar  as  Bishop 
Andrewes'  '  Greek  and  Latin  Devotions.'  It  has  re- 
ceived in  our  own  times  one  of  those  rare  translations 
which  make  an  old  book  new.*  It  seems  to  me  that 
the  key  to  the  influence  which  Andrewes  had  in  his 
own  day,  and  which  recommended  his  theology,  is  to 
be  found  in  his  *  Devotions.'  For  they  show  what  was 
the  true  meaning  and  reach  of  his  theology,  how  uji- 
speakably  real  and  deep  he  felt  its  language  to  be,  and 
how  natm-ally  it  allied  itself  and  was  interwoven  with 
the  highest  frames  of  thought  and  feeling  in  a  mind 
of  wide  range,  and  a  soul  of  the  keenest  self-know- 
ledge and  the  strongest  sympathies.  There  are  books 
which  go  deeper  into  the  struggles,  the  questionings, 
the  temptations,  the  disci23line,  the  strange  spiritual 
mysteries  of  the  devout  spirit.  There  are  books 
which  perhaps  rise  higher  in  the  elevations  of  devo- 
tion. But  nowhere  do  we  see  more  so  orio:inal  and 
spontaneous  a  result  of  a  man's  habits  of  devotion ; 
nowhere,  that  I  know  of,  does  the  whole  mind  of  the 
student,  the  divine,  and  the  preacher,  reflect  itself  in 
his  prayers  so  simply  and  easily  and  harmoniously 


By  Dr.  Xewmm,  in  1810. 


]  02  MASTERS   IN    ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  :      • 

as  in  tliis  book.  His  knowledge,  Lis  tastes,  his 
systematic  and  methodical  theology,  the  order  and 
articles  of  his  creed,  translate  themselves  into  the 
realities  of  worship.  All  his  interests,  all  his  custo- 
mary views  of  God,  of  man,  of  nature,  of  his  relations 
to  his  place  and  time — all  that  he  has  been  reading 
about  or  employed  upon,  suggest  themselves  when  he 
places  himself  in  God's  presence,  and  find  their  natural 
and  fit  expression  in  the  beautifully  applied  words  of 
Psalm  or  ancient  Liturgy.  Nothing  can  be  more  com- 
prehensive and  more  complete  in  their  proportions 
than  his  devotions  for  each  day ;  nothiug  more  tender 
and  solemn ;  nothing  more  compressed  and  nervous 
than  their  language.  The  full  order  of  prayer  and 
all  its  parts  is  always  there :  the  introductory  con- 
templation, to  sober,  to  elevate,  to  kindle ;  the  con- 
fession, the  profession  of  faith,  the  intercession,  the 
praise  and  thanksgiving.  There  is  equally  there  the 
consciousness  of  individual  singleness,  and  the  sense 
of  great  and  wide  corporate  relations.  His  confes- 
sions show  in  severely  restrained  and  j)recise  language 
the  infinite  acknowledgment  of  un worthiness  and 
want,  and  the  infinite  hope  in  God's  mercy  and  love, 
in  one  who  searched  and  judged  himself  with  keen 
and  unflinching  truth.  But  he  did  not  stop  at  him- 
self, his  sius  and  hopes.  He  also  felt  himself,  even 
in  private  prayer,  one  of  the  great  body  of  God's 
creation  and  God's  Church.  He  reminded  himself  of 
it,  as  he  did  of  the  Object  of  his  worship,  in  the  profes- 


LANCELOT   AXDEEWES.  103 

sion  of  his  faith.  He  acted  on  it  in  his  detailed  and 
minute  intercessions.  And  then  he  surrendered  him- 
self to  the  impulses  of  exulting  wonder  and  rejoicing 
at  the  greatness  of  his  Christian  lot.  The  poetical  and 
imaginative  side  of  his  nature  shows  itself  in  tlie  vivid 
pictures  which  he  calls  up,  with  a  few  condensed  and 
powerful  touches,  of  the  glories  of  Kature,  and  the 
wonders  of  God's  kingdom,  its  history,  its  manifold 
organisation.  Thus,  "  the  connection  of  every  day," 
says  a  writer  before  quoted.  Dr.  Mozley,*  '*  with  the 
great  works  which  each  day  saw  in  the  work  of  crea- 
tion, converts  the  several  days  of  the  week  into  beau- 
tiful mementos  of  the  fact  that  we  and  all  that  we  see 
are  God's  creatures,  as  well  as  of  the  sanctity  of  the 
w^ee'k  itself  as  a  division  of  time  ;  and  it  evidences  that 
character  of  mind  in  the  writer  which  realises  the 
facts  of  Scripture,  sees  mysteries  in  common  things^ 
and  feels  itself  still  living  amid  visible  traces  of 
a  Divine  dispensation.  It  is  obvious  how  such  a 
method  gives  the  beauty  of  natural  objects  a  place 
in  his  religion."  The  Apostles'  Creed  is  no  dry 
recital,  but  expands  day  after  day  into  petitions  and 
desires  founded  on  its  awful  facts.  And  so  again, 
"man,  human  society,  his  country,  as  an  object  of 
prayer,  is  not  the  mere  human  mass — a  number  of 
individuals,  but  man  and  man  in  certain  relations 
to  each  other,  high  and  low,  rich  and  poor,  king  and 


British  Critic,  Jan.  1845,  pp.  189-192. 


104      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

subject,  noble  and  dependent,  all  living  together  in 
the  system  of  God's  ordinance,"  .  .  . .  "  actual  trades 
and  states  of  life,"  definitely  enumerated,  as  Homer 
enumerates  names  of  men  and  places;  not  only  "  king 
and  queen,  parliament  and  judicature,  army  and 
police,  commons  and  their  leaders,"  but  "farmers, 
graziers,  fishers,  merchants,  traders,  and  mechanics, 
down  to  mean  workmen  and  the  poor."  There  is 
no  class  of  men,  no  condition,  no  relation  of  life, 
no  necessity  or  emergency  of  it,  which  does  not  at 
one  time  or  another  rise  up  before  his  memory, 
and  claim  his  intercession :  none  for  which  he  does 
not  see  a  place  in  the  order  of  God's  world,  and  find 
a  refuge  under  the  shadow  of  His  wing. 

Into  such  devotions  I  think  it  would  be  impossible 
to  translate  the  Puritan  theology  of  the  time.  It  is  too 
narrow,  too  suspicious,  too  much  enslaved  to  technical 
forms  and  language.  The  piercing  and  rapid  energy 
of  Andrewes'  devotions,  their  ordinary  severe  concise- 
ness, their  nobleness  and  manliness,  their  felicitous 
adaptations,  their  free  and  varied  range,  the  way  in 
which  they  call  up  before  the  mind  the  whole  of  the 
living  realities  of  God's  creation  and  God's  revelations, 
and,  in  the  portion  devoted  to  praise,  their  rhythmical 
flow  and  music,  incorporating  bursts  of  adoration  and 
Eucharistic  triumph  for  the  Liturgies  of  St.  James 
or  St.  Chrysostom,  recalling  the  most  ancient  Greek 
hymns  of  the  Church,  the  "  Gloria  in  Excelsis  "  and 
the    Evening  Hymn,  preserved  at  the   end  of  the 


LANCELOT   ANDREWES.  105 

Alexandrian  manuscript  of  the  New  Testament,* — 
all  this  is  in  the  strongest  contrast  to  anything  that 
I  know  of  in  the  private  devotions  of  the  time.  It 
was  the  reflection,  in  private  prayer,  of  the  tone  and. 
language  of  the  public  Book  of  Common  Prayer,  its 
Psalms,  and  its  Offices :  it  supplemented  the  public 
book,  and  carried  on  its  spirit  from  the  Church  to  the 
closet.  And  this  was  the  counterpart  of  what  Andrewes 
taught  in  the  pulpit.  To  us  it  shows  how  real  and 
deeply  held  his  theology  was ;  and  it  also  explains 
that  persuasiveness  of  conviction,  which  has  as  much 
to  do  as  intellectual  force  and  breadth,  in  making 
men  listen  to  their  teachers  and  accept  their  words. 
The  reformed  English  Church  had  had  its  martyrs, 
statesmen,  doctors,  champions  ;  in  Andrewes  it  had  a 
saint — not  called  so,  not  canonised,  but  one  in  whom 
men  felt  the  irresistible  [charm  of  real  holiness.  It 
had  some  one  in  high  place  not  only  to  admire,  but 
to  love.  And  churches  need  saints,  as  much  as 
theologians  and  statesmen,  and  even  martyrs. 

In  these  ways,  Andrewes  marks  a  period  and  a 
step  in  the  unfolding  of  the  theology  of  the  Eeformed 
Chm-ch  of  England  and  in  the  practical  course  of  the 
Keformation.  Hooker  had  vindicated  on  its  behalf 
the  rights  of  Christian  and  religious  reason,  that 
reason  which  is  a  reflection  of  the  mind  of  God. 


*  «l>a;s  iA-apoV;  translated  in  the  'Lyra  Apostolica,' No.  62.  See 
Bingham,  vol.  iv.  p.  -ill. 


106      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

Andrewes  vindicated  on  its  belialf  the  rights  of  Chris- 
tian liistonj.  Hooker  had  maintained  the  claims  of 
reason,  against  a  slavish  bondage  to  narrow  and 
arbitrary  interpretations  of  the  letter  of  Scripture. 
Andrewes  claimed  for  the  English  Church  its  full 
interest  and  membership  in  the  Church  universal, 
from  which  Puritan  and  Eomanist  alike  would  cut  off 
the  island  Church  by  a  gulf  as  deep  as  the  sea.  The 
spirit  of  historical  investigation  had  awoke  in  England 
as  in  the  rest  of  Europe,  against  the  passion  for 
abstract  and  metaphysical  argument  which  had 
marked  and  governed  the  earlier  stages  of  the 
Eeformation.  It  had  converted  Causaubon  from 
Calvinism,  and  at  the  same  time  made  him  the  most 
formidable  critic  of  the  magnificent,  but  unhisto- 
rical  picture  presented  in  the  annals  of  Baronius. 
Widened  knowledge  had  done  as  much  for  Andrewes 
and  the  men  of  his  school,  Field  and  Donne  and 
Overall,  may  I  not  add,  in  this  matter,  Andrewes' 
close  friend.  Lord  Bacon?  History  had  enlarged 
their  ideas  of  the  Church  universal.  Its  facts  and 
concrete  lessons  and  actual  words  had  overborne  the 
traditions  and  general  assumptions  in  which  the 
necessities  of  an  age  of  religious  war  had  educated 
them.  They  opened  their  eyes  and  saw  that  the 
prerogatives  which  the  Puritans  confined  to  an  in- 
visible Church,  and  which  Rome  confined  to  the 
obedience  of  the  Pope,  belonged  to  the  universal 
historical   Church,  lasting  on  with  varied  fortunes 


LA^'CELOT    AN DE EWES.  107 

tlirougli  all  the  centuries  from  the  days  of  Pentecost ; 
on  earth  "  the  habitation  of  God  through  the  spirit." 
Maintaining  jealously  and  stoutly  the  inherent  and 
indefeasible  rights  of  the  national  Church  of  England, 
and  resisting  with  uncompromising  determination 
the  tyranny  which  absorbed  in  a  single  hand  the 
powers  of  the  Catholic  Church,  they  refused  to  forget, 
even  in  England,  what  God's  Spirit  had  done  in 
other  portions  of  Christendom,  perhaps  far  removed, 
perhaps  for  the  time  bitterly  hostile.  They  learned 
to  pray,  as  Andrewes  did,  ''  for  the  Catholic  Church, 
its  establishment  and  increase  ;  for  the  Eastern,  its 
deliverance  and  union ;  for  the  AYestern,  its  adjust- 
ment and  peace ;  for  the  British,  the  supply  of  what 
is  wanting  in  it,  the  strengthening  of  that  which  re- 
mains in  it."  They  recognised  the  authority  of  its 
great  and  unquestionable  decisions.  They  were  willing 
to  appeal  to  its  authority,  if  it  could  be  expressed 
legitimately.  They  introduced,  even  into  controversy, 
at  least  to  some  extent,  the  habits  of  discrimination 
and  respect.  Their  teaching  shows  how,  after  the 
first  fever  and  excitement  of  the  revolt  against 
Eoman  usurpation  had  passed,  the  leaders  of  the 
English  Church  felt  that  much  natural  mistatement 
and  exaggeration  had  to  be  qualified  and  corrected  ; 
it  shows  how  anxious  they  were,  in  accordance  with 
the  declared  policy  of  the  Keformation,  to  keep 
hold  on  the  undivided  and  less  corrupted  Church  of 
the  early  centuries  as  their  standard  and  guide :  it 


108  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

shows  how  much  they  found  in  their  increased  ac- 
quaintance with  it,  to  enrich,  to  enlarge,  to  invi- 
gorate, to  give  beauty,  proportion  and  force  to  their 
theology. 

Still,  as  I  said  before,  in  this  unique  example  of 
Ciiurch  polity,  unique  in  its  constitutiou,  unique  in 
its  strong  permanence  and  its  fruitfulness,  they 
hardly  attempted  a  complete,  consistent,  systematic 
theory.  There  was  none  agreed  upon.  There  was 
none  put  forward,  as  in  the  vast  elaborate  systems 
in  fashion  on  the  Continent,  where,  in  folio  after 
folio,  everything  is  rigorously  deduced  from  its 
principles,  and  everything  is  in  order  and  in  its  place. 
To  the  views  and  positions  of  Andrewes  and  his 
school,  broadly  stated,  there  were  obvious  objec- 
tions which  they  did  not  care  to  probe,  and  to 
which  an  answer  might  not  have  been  easy,  xind 
their  appeal  to  the  idea  of  Church  authority  grew 
into  shape,  and  the  ecclesiastical  administration  based 
on  it  was  carried  on  and  enforced,  under  the  shield  of 
James  I.'s  interpretation  of  the  Koyal  Supremacy, 
which  meant  a  right  to  meddle  with  everything,  and 
settle  everything  by  his  personal  wisdom.  But  I 
suppose  the  truth  was,  thougli  they  felt  it  only  in  a 
partial  way  and  without  putting  it  into  words,  that 
they  saw  that  though  the  English  Church,  accord- 
ing to  the  current  theories,  was  an  anomaly,  it  was 
only  an  anomaly  among  anomalies, — amid  universal 
anomaly.     The  sins,  the  crimes,  the  misrule  of  cen- 


LANCELOT   ANDRE  WES.  109 

turies  had  brought  their  inevitable,  their  irreme- 
diable consequences,  and  made  claims  and  rules 
inapplicable  and  impossible  which  belonged  to 
times  when  these  evils  were  yet  in  the  future. 
It  was  a  saying  of  a  wise  observer,*  that  "  whoever 
enters  on  the  study  of  Church  history  must  be 
prepared  for  many  surprises."  And  certainly  the 
course  of  Church  history  has  not  run,  either  for 
good  or  for  evil,  in  the  course  which  theories  would 
have  prescribed  to  it.  Stern  and  terrible  facts  stand 
up  in  it,  not  to  be  disguised  by  the  most  pretentious 
of  theories.  And,  happily  on  the  other  hand,  mis- 
chiefs which  seemed  inevitable  have  found  unthought- 
of  compensations  or  remedies.  I  doubt  whether 
Andrewes  cared  much  for  that  intellectual  complete- 
ness of  theory  which  we  make  much  of.  He  knew 
that  Eome  in  his  day  was  unprimitive,  tyrannical, 
aggressive,  unscrupulous :  he  knew  that  Puritanism 
was  narrow,  uncatholic,  cruelly  intolerant;  and  he 
would  not  be  cheated  out  of  the  facts  which  he 
saw,  for  want  of  a  convenient  theory.  He  fought 
both  Komanist  and  Puritan  with  such  weapons 
as  he  found  in  his  hand.  But  his  governing  rule 
was  a  noble  one — that  expressed  in  the  ancient 
saying,  ^Trdprav  eka')(e<i,  ravrav  Koafjuei,  "  Sparta  is 
your  portion,  do  your  best  for  Sparta : " — noble,  I 
say,  because  so  honest,  and  so  unpretending ;  for  in 


*  Charles  Marriott  of  Oriel. 


110      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

religion,  whicli  means  man's  blindness  and  weakness 
as  well  as  his  liope,  it  does  not  do  to  be  ambitious, 
or  to  claim  great  things  for  men  or  for  systems. 
England  might  have  faults,  mistakes,  shortcomings, 
inconsistencies ;  let  him  do  his  best  to  bear  their 
discredit,  or  to  mend  their  evils.  But  England  and 
its  Church  had  lived  on  before  he  was  born,  and 
would  live  on  after  he  had  done  his  part  and  passed 
away.  The  feeling  with  which  he  laboured  in  his 
work  of  life  is,  I  conceive,  expressed  in  the  following 
passage  from  Archbishop  Bramhall  :* — 

"  No  man  can  justly  blame  me  for  honouring  my 
spiritual  mother,  the  Church  of  England,  in  whose 
womb  I  was  conceived,  at  whose  breasts  I  was 
nourished,  and  in  whose  bosom  I  hope  to  die.  Bees 
by  the  instinct  of  nature  do  love  their  hives,  and  birds 
their  nests.  But  God  is  my  witness  that  I,  accord- 
ing to  my  uttermost  talent  and  poor  understanding, 
I  have  endeavoured  to  set  down  the  naked  truth  im- 
partially, without  either  favour  or  prejudice,  the  two 
capital  enemies  of  right  judgment.  .  .  My  desire 
hath  been  to  have  Truth  for  my  chiefest  friend,  and 
no  enemy  but  error.  If  I  have  had  any  bias,  it  hath 
been  desire  of  peace,  which  our  common  Saviour 
hath  left  as  a  legacy  to  His  Church,  that  I  might 
live  to  see  the  reunion  of  Christendom,  for  which  I 


*  Quoted  in    Newman's   'Prophetical    Office  of   the   Church,* 
p.  vi. 


LANCELOT   AXDEEWES.  Ill 

shall  always  bow  the  knees  of  my  heart  to  the  Father 
of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  .... 

*•'  Howsoever  it  be,  I  submit  myself  and  my  poor 
endeavours,  first  to  the  judgment  of  the  Catholic 
(Ecumenical  essential  Church,  which,  if  some  of  late 
days  have  endeavoured  to  hiss  out  of  the  school,  I 
cannot  help  it.  From  the  beginning  it  was  not  so. 
And  if  I  should  mistake  the  right  Catholic  Church 
out  of  human  frailty,  or  ignorance  (which  for  my 
part,  I  have  no  reason  in  the  world  to  suspect ;  yet 
it  is  not  impossible,  when  the  Romanists  themselves 
are  divided  into  five  or  six  several  opinions,  what 
this  Catholic  Church,  or  Avhat  their  Infallible 
Judge  is),  I  do  implicitly,  and  in  the  preparation 
of  my  mind,  submit  myself  to  the  True  Catholic 
Church,  the  Spouse  of  Christ,  the  Mother  of 
the  Saints,  the  Pillar  of  Truth.  And  seeing  my 
adherence  is  firmer  to  the  Infallible  Rule  of  Faith, 
i.  e.  the  Holy  Scriptures  interpreted  by  the  Catholic 
Church,  than  to  mine  own  private  judgment  and 
opinions;  although  I  should  unwittingly  fall  into 
an  error,  yet  this  cordial  submission  is  an  implicit 
retractation  thereof,  and  I  am  confident  will  be  so 
accepted  by  the  Father  of  Mercies,  both  from  me 
and  from  all  others  who  seriously  and  sincerely  do 
seek  after  peace  and  truth. 

"  Likewise  I  submit  myself  to  the  Representative 
Church,  that  is,  to  a  free  General  Council,  or  so 
General  as  can  be  procured ;  and  until  then,  to  the 


112      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

Church  of  England,  wherein  I  was  baptised,  or  to  a 
National  English  Synod.  To  the  determination  of 
all  which,  and  of  each  of  them  respectively,  according 
to  the  distinct  degree  of  their  authority,  1  yield  a 
conformity  and  compliance,  or  at  the  least,  and  to 
the  lowest  of  them,  an  acquiescence.'" 

For  principles  and  convictions  such  as  these, 
Andrewes,  pre-eminently  among  our  Divines,  made 
a  home  in  the  Reformed  Church  of  England.  It 
was  these  principles  and  convictions  which  taught 
English  Churchmen  of  the  next  generation,  amid 
the  direst  ruin  that  ever  fell  on  an  institution,  in 
exile  abroad  among  mocking  or  pitying  strangers, 
in  utter  overthrow  at  home,  not  to  despair  of  the 
Church  of  Eno-land. 


WILLIAM   CHILLmaWORTH, 

Born  a.d.  1602  :  Died  a.d.  1644. 


"  The  Bible  the  Religion  of  Protestants  " — Its  defects  as  a  defini- 
tion— Life  of  Chillingworth  —  The  occasion  and  form  of  his 
book — His  merits  and  defects — His  effective  answers  (1)  to 
Eome's  boast  of  certainty  ;  (2)  to  her  claim  of  infallibility  ;  (3) 
to  that  of  being  the  sole  authoritative  interpreter  of  Scripture 
— The  width  of  Chillingworth's  tolerance  —  His  book  con- 
demned by  Puritans — His  own  inconsistencies  and  lapse  into 
intolerance — The  incompleteness  of  his  method — His  defects  as 
a  studeut  of  Scripture  and  Church  History — Defended  against 
Keble's  charge  of  Arianism — His  book  more  perilous  than 
useful  for  minds  drifting  Eomewards — The  more  excellent  way. 

The  wide  fame  of  William  Chillingworth  may  be 
said,  with  scarcely  an  exaggeration,  to  rest  almost, 
if  not  altogether,  on  a  single  paragraph.  It  is,  as 
its  popularity  has  proved,  telling  and  effective 
enough.  He  had  been  challenged  to  say  what  he 
meant  when  he  said  that  the  religion  of  Protestants 
was  a  safe  way  of  salvation,  and  he  accepted  the 
challenge  and  replied,  near  the  close  of  his  great 
argument : — *'  By  the  religion  of  Protestants  I  do 
not  understand  the  doctrine  of  Luther,  or  Calvin, 
or  Melanchthon;  nor  the  confession  of  Augusta 
(xiugsburg),  or  Geneva ;  nor  the  Catechism  of  Heidel- 
[king's  coll.]  I 


114      MASTEKS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

berg,  nor  the  Articles  of  the  Church  of  Eugland  ; 
no,  nor  the  harmony  of  Protestant  confessions;  but 
that   wherein   they  all   agree,  and   which  they  all 
subscribe  with  a  greater  harmony  as  a  perfect  rule 
of  their  faith  and  actions,  that  is,  the  Bible.     The 
Bible,  I  say,  the  Bible  only,  is  the  religion  of  Pro- 
testants.   Whatsoever  else  they  believe  beside  it,  and 
the  plain,  irrefragable,  indubitable  consequences  of 
it,  well  may  they  hold  it  as  a  matter  of  opinion ;  but, 
as  matter  of  faith  and  religion,  neither  can  they, 
with  coherence  to  their  own  grounds,  believe  it  of 
themselves,  nor  require  the   belief  of  it   of  others, 
Avithout   most  high   and  schismatical   presumption. 
I,  for  my  part,  after  a  long,  and  (as  I  verily  believe 
and   hope)   impartial   search  of  *the   true   way  to 
eternal  happiness,'  do  profess  plainly  that  I  cannot 
find  any  rest  for  the  sole  of  my  foot  but  upon  this 
rock  only.     I  see  plainly  with  mine  own  eyes   that 
there   are   Popes   against    Popes,   Councils   against 
Councils,   some    Fathers  against   others,    the  same 
Fathers  against  themselves,  a  consent  of  Fathers  of 
one  age  against  a  consent  of  Fathers  of  another  age, 
the  Church  of  one  age  against  the  Church  of  another. 
...  In  a  word,  there  is  no  sufficient  certainty  but 
of  Scripture  only  for  any  considering  man  to  build 
upon.  .  .  .  Propose  me  anything  out  of  this  book, 
and  require  whether  I  believe  it  or  no,  and  seem  it 
never  so  incomprehensible  to  human  reason,  I  will 
bubscribe  it  wdth  hand  and  heart,  as    knowing  no 


WILLIAM   CHILLINGWORTH.  115 

demonstration  can  be  stronger  than  this — God  hath 
said  so,  and  therefore  it  is  true."* 

"  The  Bible  and  the  Bible  only  is  the  religion  of 
Protestants,"  There  is  the  sentence  which  has 
made  Chillinofworth  more  "  ever-memorable"  than 
his  friend  John  Hales.  Trumpeted  on  platforms, 
standing  on  title-pages  as  a  motto,  the  cry  of  a  party, 
the  watchword  of  controversialists  who,  agreeing  in 
nothing  else,  agreed  in  that ;  coming  by  the  strange 
irony  of  history  to  be  blazoned  on  the  banners,  not  of 
the  advocates  of  freedom  and  tolerance  and  un- 
restrained inquiry,  but  of  the  school  that  is  most 
narrow  and  jealous  and  bitter  in  its  relations  to  such 
freedom, — the  sentence  lives,  and  will  continue,  for 
good  or  evil,  to  live  among  us  for  many  a  long  day 
as  a  word  of  power. 

And  yet  there  is,  if  I  mistake  not,  something  of 
a  false  ring  in  it.  I  reserve  for  the  present  the 
question  how  far  it  presents  a  satisfying  ground  of 
faith,  or  a  true  method  for  the  attainment  of  re- 
ligious truth.  But,  prior  to  that  inquiry,  it  is  obviously 
inaccurate  in  its  pointed  terseness.  Keligion,  in  any 
adequate  sense  of  the  word,  includes  faith  and  love, 
and  character  and  conduct.  It  is  a  life,  and  not  a 
book,  however  sacred  the  book  may  be.  Other  words, 
which  tell  us  what  to  think  of  as ''  pure  and  undefiled 
religion,"!  rise  instinctively  in  our  memories  as  a  far 


Eeligion  of  Protestants,*  I.  vi.  56.  t  James  i.  27. 

I  2 


116      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

better  definition.  What  Chillingworth  meant,  as 
lie  explains  in  the  immediate  context,  is  that  the 
Bible  is  a  "perfect  rule  of  faith  and  action,"  and 
that  a  true  religion  consists  in  following  that  rule. 
But  the  sentence,  taken  by  itself,  tends,  in  its  clap- 
trap form,  to  an  unreasoning  Bibliolatry.  Men  have 
been  led  by  it  to  think  of  the  Bible  as  a  book,  and 
not  as  a  library  of  many  books.  They  have  resented 
and  resisted  any  inquiry  into  the  claims  of  each 
separate  book,  or  any  part  of  any  book,  to  a  place 
in  that  library.  They  have  clothed  every  part  of 
every  book  with  an  equally  infallible  authority,  and 
have  refused  to  admit  the  thought  of  graduated  and 
varied  teaching.  "  God  has  said  so,  and  therefore  it  is 
true,"  has  been  their  answer  to  critics  and  historians 
and  men  of  science  who  pressed  conclusions  that 
seemed  adverse  to  the  claims  thus  set  up.  I  do  not 
say  that  Chillingworth  foresaw  these  results.  I 
believe  that  the  largeness  of  heart  and  the  restless 
spirit  of  discussion  which  placed  him  in  advance  of  his 
age  in  the  seventeenth  century  would  have  kept  him 
in  advance  still,  had  he  lived  in  the  nineteenth  ;  but 
it  is  clear  that  he  is  answerable  for  having  supplied 
those  who  wanted  a  "  cry "  with  which  to  attack 
others  whose  thoughts  were  wider  than  their  own, 
with  one  so  convenient  for  their  purpose.  The 
"masters  of  those  who  know,"  men  like  Hooker 
and  Butler,  would  never  have  committed  them- 
selves to  so  perilous  an  epigram. 


WILLIAM   CHILLINGWORTH.  117 

One  passage  in  the  paragraph  just  quoted  leads 
us  to  ask  more  as  to  the  writer's  life,  and  what  we 
learn,  beyond  all  question,  deepens  our  interest  in 
him.     He  speaks  of  his  "  long  and  impartial  search 
of  the  true  way  of  eternal  happiness."     We  find,  on 
turning  to  his  life,  what  he  thus  refers  to.     Baptised 
under  the  sponsorship    of  Laud,   and  brought   up 
under  his  influence  ;  entering  Oxford  as  a  scholar  of 
Trinity  at  the  ajre  of  sixteen,  and  becomins:  a  Fellow 
at  twenty-six ;  taking  to  no  professional  or,  as  far  as 
we  know,  tutorial  work  ;  gifted  with  a  natural  turn  for 
argumentative  debate,  his  life  was  pre-eminently  that 
of  a  student  and  inquirer.     Such  a  man,  in  that  time 
and  in  that  place,  could  not  fail  to  be  drawn  to  the 
great  controversy,  which  then  filled  men's  minds,  as 
to  the  claims  of  Komanism  on  the  one  side,  and  of 
Anglicanism  and   Protestantism    (not   as   yet   con- 
trasted terms,  though  tending  to  become  so)  on  the 
other.     The    Jesuit   Fisher,   memorable   as   Laud's 
opponent   in   the   controversy,  found  him   in   this 
state,  and  plied  him,  only  too  effectually,  with  the 
stock   arguments   in   favour  of  the  claims   of  the 
Komish  Church  to  infallible  authority.     In  the  year 
1629  he  joined  that  Church,  and  passed  from  his 
Fellowship   at   Trinity   to  a   renewed  pupillage  in 
the  Jesuit  seminary  at  Douay.     His  turn  for  asking 
questions,   and    not    resting   content    with    evasive 
answers,  soon  made  him  impatient  of  his  life  there. 
He  became  a  *•  doubting  Papist,"  and,  once  again, 


118      MASTEES  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

"of  a  doubting  Papist  a  confirmed  Protestant." 
Laud  had  come  to  the  rescue  with  his  arguments  for 
Protestantism,  and  the  bird  escaped  out  of  the  snare 
of  the  fowler.  If  he  did  not  return  at  once  to  the  ful- 
ness of  his  first  love,  and  was  content  to  remain  as  in 
lay  communion  with  the  Church  of  England,  while 
he  shrank  from  entering  her  ministry,  it  was  because 
she  seemed  to  him  to  have  retained  (notably  in  the 
damnatory  clauses  of  the  Athanasian  Creed)  some- 
what too  much  of  the  intolerance  and  anathema- 
tising spirit  of  the  Church  of  Eome.  Here  also  he 
found  (the  phrase  seems  to  have  been  a  favourite  one 
with  him)  a  "  high  and  schismatical  presumption."  * 
It  is  clear  from  the  interesting  "  Aj^ologia  pro  vita 
sua"  which  forms  part  of  the  Preface  to  the  '  Keligion 
of  Protestants,'  that  he  looked  back  upon  these 
oscillations  with  no  shame  or  regret.  It  was  not 
discreditable  to  his  intellect  to  have  been  dissatisfied 
with  the  popular  arguments  for  Protestantism,  which 
satisfied  less  acute  minds,  nor  to  have  been  dazzled 
for  a  time  by  the  glamour  of  an  alien  system  which 
promised  to  solve  his  difficulties ;  still  less  to  have 
detected  the  inadequacy  of  that  solution,  and  to 
have  taken  up  a  position,  more  or  less  apart  from 
others,  of  inquiry  and  suspense.  It  was  not  dis- 
creditable to  his  character,  for  in  each  case  he  had 
made   a  real  sacrifice  for  tlie  love   of  truth.     He 


*  '  Works '  (Oxford,  1838),  I.  p.  xxvi. 


WILLIAM   CHILLINGWORTII.  119 

looked  back  with  a  serene  complacency  on  these 
changes  as  "the  most  satisfactory  actions  to  him- 
self that  ever  he  did,  and  the  greatest  victory  that 
he  ever  obtained  over  himself  and  his  affections."* 
In  joining  the  Chnrch  of  Eome,  he  had  forfeited  his 
fellowship.  In  refusing  to  sign  the  Thirty-nine 
Articles,  he  shut  himself  out  from  all  the  natural 
pathways  to  preferment  for  scholars  and  divines.  He 
was  content  to  remain  a  scholar,  and  the  friend  of 
scholars,  and  among  those  friends  were  Hales,  and 
Seldeu,  and  Falkland.f 

Such  was  his  position  when,  in  1638,  he  entered 
on  the  work  to  which  he  owes  his  reputation.  There 
had  been  skirmishes  before  with  Jesuits  whom  he 
had  known  at  Douay  and  elsewhere,  Lewgar  and 
Floyd  ;  but  the  controversy  assumed  a  w  ider  aspect, 
and  he  entered  the  list  prepared  to  do  battle  with 
more  redoubtable  foes.  He  was  encouraged  and 
patronised  in  his  work  by  Laud.  It  was  submitted 
to  Prideaux  and  Fell,  and  the  then  Vice-Chancellor 
of  Oxford,  for  their  approval.  It  was  dedicated  to 
the  King.  It  was  in  part  written  at  Great  Tew,  the 
family  seat  of  Falkland,  and  not  without  the  counsels 
of  the  men  who  gathered  there  as  Falkland's  guests. 
It  was  known  that  he  w^as  about  to  write,  and 
his  opponents  sought  to  deter  him  by  a  libellous 
pamphlet,  taunting   him   with   the   changes   in   his 


Kelidon  of  Protestants,'  I.  v.  103.  f  Preface,  §  29. 


120      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

religion,  insinuating  that  he  tuned  his  voice  accord- 
ing to  the  time,  and  was  in  heart  a  Socinian ; 
threatening  him  with  the  pubh'cation  of  papers  that 
he  had  written  against  Protestantism  while  he  w^as 
under  Fisher's  influence. 

We  naturally  turn  to  a  work  by  such  a  man, 
written  under  such  conditions,  with  very  high  expec- 
tations. I  am  constrained  to  say  that  I  think  that 
in  most  cases  those  expectations  are  destined  to  a 
very  grievous  disappointment.  The  book  is  essen- 
tially the  work  of  a  second-rate,  not  of  a  first-rate 
thinker ;  of  a  mind  logical,  acute,  disputatious,  but 
not  endowed  with  the  "vision  and  the  faculty  di- 
vine "  which  gives  width  and  equilibrium,  and  order 
and  lucidity.  The  plan  of  the  book  is  eminently 
characteristic  of  a  controversialist  of  the  second 
order.  It  is  not  a  calm  survey  of  the  whole 
question,  but  is  the  fourth  in  a  series  of  pamphlet- 
volumes,  which  have  to  be  mastered  before  it  can  be 
properly  understood.  A  Jesuit  writer  named  Knott, 
with  an  alias  of  Wilson,  had  published,  in  1630,  a 
book  under  the  title  of  'Charity  Mistaken,'  which 
had  for  its  object  to  show  that  the  truest  charity  on 
the  part  of  Catholics  was  to  declare  that  "  Protestancy 
unrepented  destroys  salvation,"  and  that  they  were 
"  mistaken,"  i.e.  misjudged,  when  they  were  charged 
with  want  of  charity  for  doing  so.  He  was  answered, 
in  1633,  by  Dr.  Potter,  Provost  of  Queens'  College, 
Oxford,  and  replied  in  a  volume  of  greater  length 


WILLIAM   CHILLING  WORTH.  121 

and  considerable  power,  with  the  title  of  *  Mercy 
and  Truth,  or  Charity  maintained  by  Catholics.'  It 
was  to  refute  this  reply  that  Chillingworth  set  to 
work.  He  stood  proof  against  Knott's  unscrupulous 
attempt  to  blacken  his  character  before  his  book  was 
published.  He  had  the  courage  to  print  the  treatise 
which  he  answered  in  extenso,  and  then  dissect  it, 
chapter  by  chapter,  section  by  section,  almost 
sentence  by  sentence.  He  exliibits  in  doing  so  a 
singular  readiness  in  applying  the  forms  of  logic, 
such  as  led  Locke  to  recommend  the  ^Eeligion  of 
Protestants'  as  a  mental  athletic  exercise,  apart  from 
the  conclusions  which  it  advocates.  Few  men  are 
more  skilful  in  detecting  the  use  of  equivocal  terms, 
or  an  undistributed  middle,  or  an  illicit  process  of 
the  minor.  But  the  result  of  this,  carried  through  a 
folio  volume,  is,  as  I  think  most  readers  must  feel, 
somewhat  tedious,  jarring,  and  eminently  unsatis- 
fying. The  controversy  is  involved  in  endless  person- 
alities. Had  Dr.  Potter  fairly  represented  *  Charity 
Mistaken,'  or  adequately  answered  this  or  that 
paragraph  in  it  ?  Had  *  Charity  Maintained  '  fairly 
represented  or  adequately  answered  this  or  that  para- 
graph of  Dr.  Potter's  ?  I  frankly  confess  that  I 
have  not  cared  to  read  the  books  which  are  the  first 
two  terms  in  the  series,  and  I  doubt  whether  any 
man  living  has.  I  feel,  M'ith  Pascal,  that  life  is  too 
short  and  work  too  pressing  to  give  much  time  to 
these  third-rate  books.     But,  taking  the   last  two 


122      MASTEES  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

treatises,  as  they  are  printed  together,  the  impression 
which  they  leave  on  one's  mind  is  that  of  two  dispu- 
tants, not  unfairly  matched,  holding  an  exercise,  alter 
the  old  fashion,  in  the  Divinity  School  of  a  Univer- 
sity ;  of  two  eminent  counsel  in  some  cause  celebre, 
who  come  last  in  the  hearing  of  the  case,  and  whose 
speeches  are  crammed  with  references  to  the  argu- 
ments of  those  who  have  preceded  them.  It  is  clear,  I 
think,  that  a  mind  of  the  first  order  would  have  chosen 
quite  another  method  than  this,  and  would  have 
risen  to  the  height  of  the  great  argument.  Hooker 
and  Butler  had  definite  opponents  enough.  There 
is  hardly  a  sentence  in  their  great  works  which  was 
not  meant  to  bear  upon  something  that  those  oppo- 
nents had  said ;  but  they  had  the  generalship  which 
enabled  them  to  plan  a  campaign,  instead  of  wasting 
their  strength  in  hand-to-hand  skirmishes.  They 
rose  above  the  strife  of  tongues  into  a  serener  region, 
and  pursued,  through  years  of  patient  thought,  the 
calm  tenor  of  their  way.  It  may  sometimes  seem 
necessary,  as  in  a  recent  polemic  against  the  writer  of 
*  Supernatural  Religion,'  *  to  follow  one  who  attacks 
what  we  hold  dear,  through  a  series  of  inaccuracies 
and  misstatements,  when  the  object  is  to  diminish 
the  authority  of  the  vast  erudition  of  which  his  book 
appears  to  be  the  outcome ;  but  the  work  of  the  true 
apologist  must  be  constructive  as  well  as  destructive. 

*  I  refer,  of  course,  to  the  masterly  series  of  papers  by  Cauon 
Lightfoot  in  the  '  Contemporaiy  Review '  of  the  last  two  years. 


WILLIAM   CHILLINGWORTH. 


123 


He  does  well  to  guard  himself  as  far  as  he  can,  against 
the  cheap  triumph  of  hitting  a  blot  in  the  argument, 
or  a  mistake  in  the  alleged  facts,  of  his  antagonist. 
Chillingworth  was,  it  must  be  owned,  no  vulgar 
Protestant  controversialist.  His  book,  dedicated, 
as  has  been  said,  to  Charles  I.,  was  avowedly  a 
defence  of  Laud's  Conference  with  Fisher,  and 
planned  therefore,  in  part,  upon  the  same  lines.* 
The  savour  of  the  school  of  Laud  was  still  so  far  on 
him  that  he  never  presses  the  popular  declamatory 
arguments  that  Rome  was  Babylon,  and  that  the 
Pope  was  Antichrist  and  the  Man  of  Sin.  He  is 
more  tolerant  in  his  language  as  to  her  errors  than 
the  Homilies  or  the  Articles,  and  never  speaks  of 
them  as  involving  those  who  hold  them  in  damna- 
tion. He  looks  with  respect  and  affection  on  many 
of  the  Eoman  Catholic  friends  who  held  aloof  from 
him.t  Still  less  is  he  a  Protestant  on  the  Puritan- 
Calvinistic  side  of  Protestantism.  He  shrinks  from 
its  unloving  and  unlovely  dogmatism;  from  the 
Antinomian  tendencies  of  its  doctrine  of  justification 
by  faith,  from  the  claims  of  its  wilder  followers  to  a 
special  illumination,  from  the  tangled  mazes  of  its 
reasonings  about  the  Divine  decrees,  from  the  bare- 
ness and  meagreness  of  its  outward  forms  of  worship.  J 


*  Epistle  Dedicatory  to 
Charles  I. 

t  "  My  own  particular  obliga- 
tions to  many  of  you,  such  and 
so  great  that  you  cannot  perish 


without  part  of  myself"  ('Ee- 
ligion  of  Protestants,'  i.  5). 

X  '  Keligion    of   Protestants,' 
Pref.  §  22. 


124  MASTERS   IN   EN^GLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

There   were   clearly   niany   points    of   sympathy — 
more  than  many  of  those  who  quote  Chilling  worth 
imagine — between  such  a  man  and  Laud.    ^A^e  cannot 
wonder  that  the  great  representative  of  the  Angli- 
canism of  the  Stuart  period  should  have  endeavoured 
to  secure  so  able  a  writer  for  the  ministry  of  the 
Church  of  England,  and  have  persuaded  him  to  sign 
the  Articles  and  to  accept  the  Damnatory  Clauses 
under    the    cover   of    the   wide   latitude   for   open 
questions  offered  by  the  King's  declaration,  written, 
it  is  believed,  by  Laud  himself,  and  prefixed  to  the 
Articles,  as  if  it  were  an  authoritative  expression  of 
the  meaning  of  subscription.     On  the  other  hand, 
his  position  in  relation  to  the  Church  of  Kome  is  not 
that  of  the  patristic  Anglican.     His  charge  against 
her  is  not  that  she  has  sinned  against  the  tradition 
of  the  third  or  the  fourth  century,  but  that  she  has 
sinned  against  Scripture.     His  argument  against  her 
claim  to  speak  with  infallibility  is  not — or  at  least 
not  prominently — that  such   and  such  Fathers  are 
witnesses  against  it,  that  this  or  that  Pope  has  been 
involved  in  acknowledged  heresy,  but  that  there  is 
no  a  priori  ground  for  expecting  the  guidance  of  a 
living  infallible  interpreter  in  addition  to  the  infal- 
lible Word  ;  that  there  is  no  Scriptural  proof  of  the 
appointment  of  such  an  interpreter ;  and  that  if  there 
were,  as  the  Church  of  Kome  teaches  that  men  only 
know  Scripture  to  be  from  God  on  her  authority, 
men  would  still  be  treading  in  the  circle  of  a  vicious 


WILLIAM   CHILLINGWORTH.  125 

and  inconclusive  reasoning.  It  was  to  be  expected 
that  a  mind  more  than  usually  acute  would  make 
some  successful  points  in  the  conduct  of  such  an 
argument,  and  some  of  those  which  Chillingworth 
makes  are  put  with  a  masterly  dexterity.  We  have, 
it  is  true,  to  disinter  the  weapons  from  much  that  is  as 
the  lumber  of  a  bygone  age  ;  but  they  have  not  alto- 
gether lost  their  edge,  and  may  yet  be  useful  in  war- 
fare against  the  same  foe. 

(1.)  Nothing,  for  example,  can  be  more  effective 
than  his  retort  on  the  Romanist  plea  that  Protes- 
tantism leaves  the  minds  of  men  floatins^  in  un- 
certainty,  and  that  those  who  adhere  to  it  can  never 
have  an  assured  certainty  of  faith  or  hope  of 
salvation.  "  You,"  he  replies  in  substance,  "  involve 
your  followers  in  a  far  more  terrible  uncertainty. 
You  teach  that  the  validity  of  every  sacrament  but 
baptism  depends  upon  its  administration  by  a  priest ; 
that  without  priestly  absolution  there  is  no  assurance 
of  forgiveness ;  and  you  teach,  further,  that  the 
intention  of  the  priest  is  essential  when  he  celebrates 
the  Lord's  Supper  or  pronounces  absolution  ;  that 
the  intentioQ  of  the  Bishop  is  equally  essential  in 
imparting  to  him  his  priestly  character.  How  is 
any  one  to  know  whether  that  condition  has  been 
fulfilled?  How  can  any  human  intellect  fathom 
the  secret  intentions  of  those  who,  from  the  Apostles' 
time  to  our  own,  have  carried  on  the  succession  of 
the  priesthood  ?     How  can  the  penitent  know  that 


126  MASTERS  IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

the  individual  priest  from  whom  he  hears  the  words 
of  pardon  intends  to  convey  that  pardon.  If  the 
priest  turned  atheist — and  history  showed  it  was  not 
an  impossible  hypothesis — what  effect  had  the 
sacraments  so  administered  on  the  souls  of  those  who 
received  them  ?  Was  ever  any  doctrine  more  full 
of  horrible  uncertainties  than  this  ?  Was  the  Pro- 
testant who  trusted  in  the  love  of  God  revealed  in 
Christ  worse  off  as  regards  assurance  than  the 
Romanist?"*  (2.)  Or  again,  there  was  the  Romish 
argument  that  a  Church  left  without  an  infallible 
living  voice  to  decide  all  questions  as  they  arose 
would  not  answer  the  Divine  purpose  in  calling  a 
Church  into  existence;  that  Scripture,  however 
sacred  and  true,  and  in  itself  infallible,  needed  an 
interpreter ;  that  without  such  an  interpreter  the 
wants  of  men  would  not  be  adequately  met,  and  that 
it  was,  therefore,  a  necessary  consequence  of  our  faith 
in  the  wisdom  and  goodness  of  God  to  believe  that 
he  had  provided  one.  Here  his  answer  is,  after  the 
manner  of  Butler,  that  all  such  assumptions  are,  in 
the  nature  of  the  case,  shallow  and  gratuitous  ;  that 
experience,  and  not  expectation,  must  be  the  test  of 
what  actually  is  ;  that  things  are  not  always  as  we, 
in  our  weakness  and  blindness,  wish  that  they  might 
be,  and  therefore  think  they  ought  to  be,  and  believe 
that   they   must   be.     And   as   the   Roman   theory 


Religion  of  Protestants/  I,,  ii.  §§  62-68. 


■WILLIAM    CHILLIXGWORTH.  127 

implies  tliat  all  written  statements  of  truth,  eyen 
inspired  statements,  are  in  their  nature  ambiguous, 
and  therefore  need  interpretation,  how  can  we  know 
that  the  infallible  interpretation,  when  reduced  to 
writing,  may  not  be  equally  ambiguous,  and  stand, 
therefore,  equally  in  need  of  being  itself  interpreted  ? 
"What  assurance  of  faith  is  there,  on  this  assumption, 
unless   we    extend    the    hypothesis  of    infallibility 
somewhat  more  widely  ?    If  what  we  think  desirable 
is  therefore  credible,   and  therefore  true,  why  not 
postulate  an  infallible  Archbishop  in  every  province, 
an  infallible  Bishop  in  every  diocese,  an   infallible 
priest  in  every  parish,  so  that  every  believer  may  thus 
have  the  living,  unerring  voice  of  the  Church  which 
alone  can  guide  him  ?     Why,  indeed,  stop  there,  or 
hesitate  to  claim,  because  we  might  wish  it,  a  like 
infallibility  for  every  member  of  the  Church  ?*    The 
high  argument  which,  wrapt  in  the  mist  of  rhetoric, 
had    cast    its   spell   in   earlier  days    over  his    own 
intellect,   Chillingworth    thus   pushes,  as  with   the 
keenness  of  resentment,  to  a  redudio  ad  ahsurdum, 
and  there  he  leaves  it.    (3.)  Or,  once  more,  there  ^vas 
the  claim  of  Eome  to  be  the  only  guardian  of  the 
true  meaning  of  the  oracles  of  God,  on  which  she 
professed,  at  least  in  theory,  to  found  her  teaching. 
The  difficulties  of  Scripture  were  ostentatiously  pa- 
raded, the  uncertainties  which  hang  over  the  author- 
ship or  canonicity  of  this  or  that  book  of  Scripture, 

*  ♦Kelision  of  Protestants,'  I.  ii.  §  128. 


128      MASTEKS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

were  pressed  ou  the  inquirer.  What  help  was  there 
ia  going  to  translations  which  might  be  erroneous, 
to  commentaries  which  might  be  misleading  ?  How 
was  the  Protestant  believer,  an  "unlearned  and  igno- 
rant man,"  to  find  his  way  in  this  labyrinth  of  error? 
What  safety  was  there  but  in  submitting  to  the 
Church ;  to  the  divinely-appointed  head  and  ruler 
of  that  Church,  who  sat  in  the  seat  of  Peter,  and 
who  could  unfold  the  meaning  of  all  dark  and 
ambiguous  texts  ?  To  this  the  answer  was  brief  and 
telling  enough.  "If  the  Pope  can  do  this,  why  does 
he  not  write  a  Commentary  ?  Why  not  seat  himself 
in  cathedra,  and  fall  to  writing  expositions  upon  the 
Bible  for  the  direction  of  Christians  to  the  true 
sense  of  it  ?  "  *  Why  hoard  up  the  treasures  com- 
mitted to  him  instead  of  giving  them  as  alms  to  a 
hungry  and  a  thirsty  world  ?  I  do  not  know  what 
answer  was  given,  or  could  be  given,  to  this  question. 
Probably  the  outcome  of  the  editorial  work  of  the 
Papacy  in  the  manifold  discrepancies  of  the  Sixtine 
and  Clementine  texts  of  the  Vulgate  had  not  en- 
couraged it  to  go  further  in  that  direction.  The 
blunders  of  a  Commentary  could  not  be  quite  so 
easily  transferred,  as  they  had  been,  to  the  shoulders 
of  the  printer,  and  it  was  thought  safer  to  let  even 
the  Rhemish  and  Douay  versions  go  forth  as  private 
adventures,  rather  than  incur  the  risk  of  stamping 


*  '  Eeligion  of  Prote&tants,'  I.  ii.  §  95. 


WILLIAM   CHILLIXGWORTH.  129 

them  with  the  seal  of  the  fisherman  as  infallible 
representatives  of  the  Divine  originals. 

It  is  obvious  that  one  who  could  thus  reason  was  on 
the  w^ay  to  a  wide  and  comprehensive  tolerance  ;  and 
in  Chillingworth's  nobler  moods  we  find  him  giving 
utterance  to  conclusions  in  which  wisdom  and  charity 
are  alike  conspicuous.  Such  passages  have  naturally 
been  often  quoted  before,  but  they  are  worth  quoting 
again.  "  When  the  Scriptures  are  not  plain,  then  if 
we,  using  diligence  to  find  the  truth,  do  yet  miss  of 
it,  and  fall  into  error,  there  is  no  danger  in  it.  They 
that  err  and  they  that  do  not  err  may  both  be  saved. 
So  that  those  places  which  contain  things  necessary, 
and  where  no  error  was  dangerous,  need  no  infallible 
interpreters,  because  they  are  plain ;  and  those  that 
are  obscure  need  none,  because  they  contain  not  things 
necessary ;  neither  is  error  in  them  dangerous.  .  .  . 
To  say  that  God  will  damn  men  for  errors  as  to  such 
things,  who  are  lovers  of  Him  and  lovers  of  truth,  is 
to  rob  man  of  his  comfort  and  God  of  His  good- 
ness; to  make  man  desperate  and  God  a  tyrant. 
...  If  men  suffer  themselves  neither  to  be  be- 
trayed into  their  errors  nor  kept  in  them  by  any  sin 
of  their  wills,  if  they  do  their  best  endeavours  to 
free  themselves  from  all  errors  and  yet  fail  of  it 
through  human  frailty,  so  well  am  I  persuaded  of  the 
goodness  of  God,  that  if  in  me  alone  should  meet  a 
confluence  of  all  such  errors  of  all  the  Protestants  in 
the  world  that  were  thus  qualified,  I  should  not  be 

[ring's  coll.]  K 


loO      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

SO  much  afraid  of  them  all  as  I  should  to  ask  pardon 
for  them."  *  (1.)  It  is  clear  that  language  such  as  this 
^vas  a  sword  with  two  edges,  and  that  it  struck  equally 
at  the  Koman  and  Protestant  dogmatists.  And 
those  of  the  latter  school  who  were  wise  in  their 
generation,  and  saw  the  drift  of  things  as  well  as 
their  immediate  working,  were,  for  that  reason,  even 
more  bitter  in  their  hatred  of  Chillingworth  than 
the  controversialists  who  were  his  direct  antagonists. 
To  them  he  was  an  Arminian,  a  Socinian,  and  a 
sceptic.  The  fact  that  he  had  taken  Orders  under 
Laud's  influence,  and  that  he  had  joined  the  King's 
army  and,  with  a  strange  versatility  of  talent,  had 
actually  suggested  some  new  form  of  battering-ram 
lor  use  in  the  siege  of  Gloucester — possibly  also  the 
rankling  memory  of  old  antagonism  at  Oxford — may 
have  sharpened  Cheynell's  bitterness  against  the 
prisoner  on  whom  he  exercised  his  powers  of  mental 
torture ;  but  he,  and  such  as  he,  were  not  mistaken 
when  they  felt  that  their  craft  also  was  in  danger  to 
be  set  at  nought  if  this  new  doctrine  should  spread, 
and  the  final  anathema  which  he  uttered,  at  Chilling- 
worth's  funeral,  on  the  "  cursed  book — the  corrupt  and 
rotten  book  " — which  had  "  seduced  so  many  precious 
souls,"  has  but  too  many  parallels  in  the  language 
used  by  men  of  very  opposite  schools  and  j)arties,  of 
those  who,  in  later  times,  have  followed  in  Chilling- 


*  '  Eeligion  of  Protestants'  —  Answer  to  Preface  of  'Charity 
INIaiutainecl,'  p.  26. 


WILLIAM   CHILLING  WORTH.  131 

worth's   footsteps,   and   taught   as    he,   in   his  best 
moments,  taught.* 

It  was  a  hard  matter  in  that  time  of  evil  tongues 
and  evil  days  for  a  mind,  even  of  the  first  order,  to 
attain  to  its  full-orbed  completeness.     Men  had  to 
act,  and  could  not  remain  in  an  attitude  of  calm 
neutrality.   They  had  to  take  their  side,  and  to  choose 
what  seemed  to  them  the  least  of  evils,  even  while 
they  felt  painfully  the  faults  and  the  perils  of  the 
side  which  they   had  chosen.     We  dare  not  blame 
such   men  as   Falkland  and   Chillingworth  for  the 
choice  they  actually  made.     We  may  even  believe 
that   had  we  lived  under   the  same  conditions,  we 
should  have  done  as   they  did.     W'^e  cannot  read, 
without  a  pitying  sadness,  of  Falkland's  ingeminated 
*'  Peace,"  or  of  Chillingworth's  description  of  the  con- 
tending parties  as  '^  publicans  and  sinners,  on  the  one 
side,  against  Scribes  and  Pharisees  on  the  other ; " 
"  on  the  one  side  hypocrisy,  on  the  other  profaneness  ; 
no  honesty  or  justice  on  the  one  side,  and  very  little 
piety  on  the  other."!     But  also  we  cannot  think, 
without  a  sigh,  of  Falkland  as  joining  the  Council  of 
Charles  precisely  at  the  time  when  he  made  himself 
an  accessory  after  the  fact  to  the  King's  most  despotic 
outrage  on  the  liberties  of  England.     W^e  feel  a  pang 
of  regretful  shame  at  the  thought  that  the  author 
of  the  *  Religion  of   Protestants,'  identified  himself 


*  See  Tulloch's  '  Leaders  of  Keligious  Thought/  I.  p.  297. 
t  Sermon  I. 

K  2 


132  MASTEES  IX  ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

with  the  ecclesiastical  policy  of  Laud  at  the  very 
time  when  men  saw  in  it  what  was  fatal  at  once  to 
the  liberty  and  to  the  Protestantism  of  England. 
Doubtless  he  felt  that  there  was  a  hardness  and 
bitterness,  such  as  bore  its  fruit  in  the  Westminster 
Confession,  in  the  dogmatism  of  the  Presbyterians, 
which  was  worse  than  anything  he  found  in  the 
Thirty-nine  Articles  or  the  Athanasian  Creed.  The 
tolerant  latitude  allowed  to  thought,  if  not  to 
teaching,  in  the  Koyal  Declaration,  gave  him  room 
to  breathe  freely ;  and  to  a  mind  such  as  his,  not 
indisposed  to  outward  richness  and  comeliness  in 
worship,  many  of  the  questions  at  issue  between 
Laud  and  his  opponents — gestures  and  positions, 
altars  at  the  east  end  railed  round,  or  oj^en  tables 
in  the  body  of  the  church — would  seem,  rightly, 
to  come  under  the  category  of  "  things  indifferent," 
if  not  of  the  "  infinitely  little."  As  it  was,  the 
change  brought  with  it  a  certain  want  of  consistency. 
Traces  of  that  failing  are  found  even  in  his  great 
work  itself,  and  yet  more  in  the  Sermons  which  he 
preached  after  he  accepted  preferment.  He  had 
taught,  in  his  nobler  mood,  that  no  man  should 
condemn  another  who  honestly  seeks  the  truth ; 
and  he  pronounces  his  anathema  on  those  who  hold 
doctrines  which  his  Komanist  opponent  charged  him 
with  holding.*     He  looks  on  the  doctrine  that  men 


*  Preface,  §  28. 


WILLIAM   CHILLINGWORTH.  VoS 

may  be  saved  in  any  other  religion  but  that  of  Christ 
as  "impious  and  detestable."*  He  acknowledges 
an  Act  of  Parliament  of  the  1st  of  Elizabeth  as  a 
rule  of  faith ,t  and  pronounces  all  those  who  contra- 
vene it  to  be  heretics.  He  had  contended  for  freedom 
of  thought,  and  he  wishes  that  men  were  restrained 
by  authority  from  preaching  '•'  Justification  by 
Faith"  unless  they  taught  also  the  necessity  of 
obedience;  or  even  from  reading  the  chapters  of 
St.  Paul's  Epistles  that  proclaim  it,  unless  it  were 
balanced  by  reading  at  the  same  time  the  chapter 
that  dwells  on  the  excellence  of  charity  J.  He  had 
been  charged  with  tendencies  to  Socinianism,  and  he 
vindicates  himself  by  speaking  of  its  theory  of  the 
Atonement,  not  as  a  lamentable  error,  but  as  a 
"  blasphemous  heresy."§  He  had  led  men  to  think 
that  all  Scripture  that  touched  on  matters  necessary 
to  salvation  was  plain  and  easy,  and  needed  no 
authoritative  interpretation.  And  now  it  becomes 
almost  a  formula  with  him  to  call  on  his  hearers  to 
submit  themselves,  in  the  vexed  controversies  of  the 
time,  to  the  voice  of  "  our  Holy  j\Iother  the  Church, 
speaking  in  her  Articles  and  other  formularies."] 
He  disparages  Luther's  doctrine  of  justification, 
wishes  that  his  Latin  had  never  been  Englished,1[ 
and  treats   the  popular  illustrations  of  it,   "faith 


*  '  Eeligion  of  Protestants,'  I.  vii.  §  8.  t  Preface,  §  38. 

X  '  Eeligion  of  Protestants,'  I.  vii.  32.  §  Sermon  V.  29. 

y  Sermon  VII.  8,  14 ;  V.  58.  %  Sermon  V.  63. 


134 


MASTERS   IN  ENGLISH   THEOLOGY 


the  hand  that  lays  hold  of  the  righteousness  of 
CJirist,"  and  so  on,  as  mere  "flowers  of  rhetoric, 
figures,  and  metaphors."*  He  speaks  in  language 
which  would  startle  many  of  those  who  use  his  name 
and  circulate  his  book,  of  the  value  of  personal  con- 
fession and  the  efficacy  of  priestly  absolution,  as 
distinct  from  comfortable  and  quieting  words  of 
counsel.f  He  had  rightly  urged  that  "nothing  is 
more  against  religion  than  to  force  religion ;  that 
human  violence  may  make  men  counterfeit,  but 
cannot  make  them  believe  ;"  and  he  comes  to  count 
it  as  "a  greater  happiness  than  God  had  granted  to 
His  chosen  servants  in  the  infancy  of  the  Church," 
that  "  we  have  now  the  sword  of  the  civil  magistrate, 
the  power  and  enforcement  of  laws  and  statutes,  to 
maintain  our  precious  faith  against  all  heretical  or 
schismatical  oppugners  thereof."  J  The  preacher  of 
an  almost  universal  tolerance  has  become  the  advo- 
cate of  the  policy  of  the  Star  Chamber,  and  could 
not  rightly  cast  a  stone  at  that  of  the  Inquisition. 

Nor  can  it   be  said   that  his  system  of  religious 
thought,  even  in  the  treatise  to  which  he  owes  his 


*  Sermon  VIII.  40. 

t  "  Come  not  to  him  (the 
spiritual  physician)  only  with 
such  a  mind  as  you  would  go  to 
a  learned  man  experienced  in 
the  Scriptures,  as  one  that  can 
speak  comfortable  and  quieting 
words  to  you,  but  as  to  one  that 


hath  authority  delegated  to  him 
from  God  Himself  to  absolve  and 
acquit  you  of  your  sins"  (Sermon 
VII.  14). 

X  Sermon  II.  15.  Compare 
also  '  Religion  of  Protestants,'  I. 
ii.  122. 


WILLIAM   CHILLIXGWORTII.  135 

fame,  is  tliorougli  and  complete.  He  postulates  at 
once  the  sufficiency  and  the  infallibility  of  Scripture. 
If  asked  how  he  knows  the  books  which  are  recognised 
by  Protestants  to  be  Scripture,  his  answer  is,  by 
universal  tradition.  If  pressed  with  the  fact  that,  as 
regards  some  of  them,  tlie  tradition  is  not  universal, 
his  answer  is  that  there  can  in  that  case  be  no  great 
harm  or  danger  in  the  uncertainty,  or  that  a  single 
book,  such  as  the  Gospel  of  St.  Mark,  contains  all 
things  necessary  to  salvation  ;  or  that  men  may  have 
a  saving  faith  if  they  believe  the  fundamental  truths 
contained  in  Scripture,  even  though  they  have 
never  read  a  single  book  of  Scripture,  or,  reading  it, 
have  not  accepted  the  book  as  of  Divine  authority. 
He  does  not  appear  to  have  asked  himself  the 
question,  which  must  yet  be  faced,  on  what  grounds 
he  held  that  Scripture  was  infallible,*  or  to  what 
subjects  its  infallibility  extended  ;  how  far  the  human 
character  of  the  writer  is  traceable  in  what  he  wrote  ; 
how  far  there  are  different  aspects  and  phases  of  the 
truth  presented  in  it,  according  to  the  "sundry  times 
and  divers  manners  "  in  which  God  spake  unto  the 
Fathers.  We  do  not  find  in  him  even  the  reverential 
caution  that  leads  Hooker  to  protest  against  the 
"  incredible  praises  "  t  which  the  ultra-Protestant 
party  of  his  time  lavished  on  the  Scriptures  as  the 
one  certain  guide  and  standard  of  belief  and  action 


Preface,  §  28.  f  '  Eccles.  Polity,'  II.  8,  §  7. 


136  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

in  all  matters,  secular  or  religious,  human  or  Divine. 
To  him  the  Bible  is  the  Bible,  and  a  text  is  a  text, 
wherever  it  may  be  found,  to  be  quoted  as  the  end  of 
controversy.  We  do  not  find  in  him,  accordingly, 
any  trace  of  that  method  of  free  and  thoughtful 
study  of  book  by  book,  and  chapter  by  chapter,  and 
word  by  word,  of  which  Erasmus  and  Grotius  had  al- 
ready set  the  example,  and  which  even  Hammond  was 
at  the  time  carrying  on,  not  without  success ;  or  of  that 
more  devout  and  meditative  study  which  bore  such 
rich  fruitage  in  the  Sermons,  and  yet  more  in  the 
Prayers,  of  Andre wes.  He  is  haunted  at  every  step  by 
the  controversies  of  the  time,  and  far  as  he  under- 
takes iu  his  Sermons  the  work  of  an  interpreter  (and 
I  am  far  from  questioning  his  endeavours  to  be  true 
and  faithful  in  that  work)  his  chief  aim  appears  to 
be  that  of  freeing  the  favourite  texts  of  his  Puritan 
opponents  from  the  glosses  which  they  had  put 
on  them.*  He  is  as  one  standing  outside  the  goodly 
edifice  that  had  been  reared,  part  by  part,  and  with 
varying  materials,  in  successive  ages.  He  is  loud  in 
his  praises  of  its  strength  and  majesty.  Its  founda- 
tions are  on  the  eternal  rock ;  there  is  not  a  flaw 
in  any  stone  in  the  whole  building ;  it  is  an  impreg- 
nable fortress ;  he  counts  its  towers  and  bulwarks 
and  is  ready  with  his  engines  of  defence ;  but  he 
never   seems   to  have  studied  its  plan,  or  to  have 


*  See,  in  particular,  Sermon  VIII. 


WILLIAM   CHILLIXGWORTH.  lo7 

entered  into  the  tlioiiglits  of  the  master-builders  who 
were  from  time  to  time  employed  on  it,  still  less  to 
have  passed  beyond  the  vestibule  into  the  inner 
chambers,  so  as  to  bring  forth  things  both  new 
and  old  from  the  treasures  of  the  house  of  the 
interpreter. 

Nor  can  we  assign  higher  praise  to  him  as  a  student 
of  Church  history.  It  would  be  idle  to  contend  that 
he  had  not  read  Fathers  and  Councils  with  consider- 
able care,  and  could  quote  as  well  as  another  on 
occasion.  But  here  also  the  spell  of  an  age  of  con- 
troversy was  on  him.  As  he  goes  to  his  Bible  for 
texts,  so  he  iroes  to  the  Fathers  for  doGjmatic 
authorities  to  quote,  or  dogmatic  inconsistencies  to 
detect.  It  never  seems  to  occur  to  him,  or,  indeed, 
to  the  theologians  of  his  time  generally,  that  these 
men  also  were  of  like  passions  with  ourselves ;  that 
they  had  fathers  and  mothers,  and  were  once  little 
children,  and  grew  up  among  such  and  such  sur- 
roundings; that  there  was  action  and  re-action 
between  them  and  the  age  in  which  they  lived,  and 
that  each  was  more  or  less  fashioned  by  the  time 
that  lay  behind  hnn  and  helped  to  mould  that  which 
came  after  him.  Studied  after  Bacon's  method. 
Ecclesiastical  History  deserves  Bacon's  praise,* 
'*  making  men  wiser  than  St.  Augustine's  or  St. 
Ambrose's   works,"  *' teaching    learned  men   to  be 


'  Advancement  of  Learning,'  II.  i.  §  2. 


138  MASTERS    IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

wise  in  the  use  and  the  administration  of  learning." 
But  it  was  not  so  with  Chillingvvorth.  The  rich 
eloquence  and  interpretative  insight  of  John  the 
Golden-mouthed ;  the  wide  hopes  and  sympathies 
and  indefatigable  labours  of  the  saintly  Origen ; 
the  manifold  activities  of  Jerome,  as  the  translator, 
the  ascetic,  the  guide  and  director  of  the  consciences 
of  women;  the  marvellous  Confessions  in  which 
Augustine  lays  bare  the  secret  recesses  of  his  soul, — 
these  seem  to  have  had  for  him  no  meaning  and  no 
attraction,  except  so  far  as  they  helped  him  with 
a  quotation  to  fling  at  the  head  of  Puritan  or 
Papist. 

What  then  are  we  to  learn  from  the  life  and  works 
of  such  an  one  as  William  Chillingworth  ?  One 
lesson  has  been  drawn  from  it  by  a  teacher  whose  name 
we  all  hold  in  honour,  which,  because  he  has  drawn 
it,  at  least  deserves  consideration.  John  Keble 
quotes  in  full  the  passage  which  I  have  cited  at  the 
commencement  of  this  lecture,  and  adds,  as  his 
comment  on  the  words,  "  the  Bible  and  the  Bible 
only,  is  the  Keligion  of  Protestants,"  and  that  which 
follows  them, — "  It  is  melancholy  but  instructive  to 
reflect  that  the  writer  of  these  sentences  is  credibly 
reported  to  have  been  an  Arian,  or  near  it,  before  he 
died."*  It  seems  a  somewhat  strange  task  to  have 
to  defend,  as  against  the  author  of  the  *  Christian 


*  Keble's  '  Sermon  on  Primitive  Traditions,'  note  H. 


WILLIAM   CHILLINGWORTH.  139 

Year,'  tlie  man  who  was  the  disciple  of  Land,  the 
friend  of  Falkland,  the  favoured  child,  if  any  ever 
was,  of  the  school  of  Anglo-Catholic  Theology.  In 
justice,  however,  to  the  fair  fame  of  William  Chil- 
lingworth,  I  am  constrained  to  say  that  there  seems 
to  be  very  little  foundation  for  the  charge  thus 
brought.  No  evidence  is  given  by  Keble  himself; 
and,  so  far  as  I  can  gather  from  other  sources,  the 
only  proof  alleged  is  an  undated  letter,  belonging, 
it  seems  obvious,  like  another  undated  fragment 
against  capital  punishment,*  to  the  unsettled,  tran- 
sition period  of  his  life,  before  he  wrote  the  *  Keligion 
of  Protestants,'  in  which  he  maintains  "that  the 
doctrine  of  Arius  is  either  a  truth,  or,  at  least,  no 
damnable  heresy."  t  We  have  no  reason,  looking  to 
the  character  of  the  man,  and  the  sacrifices  he  had 
made  for  what  he  held  to  be  the  Truth,  to  question 
the  sincerity  with  which  he  accepted  the  Nicene 
Greed,  or  even  the  substance  of  the  Athanasian,  and 
his  Sermons  are  surely  as  little  open  to  the  charge 
of  Arianism  as  those  of  Laud  himself. 

No ;  the  lesson  of  his  life  seems,  I  think,  of  quite 
another  character  than  that.  It  is  "  melancholy  but 
instructive  "  to  note  the  evil  influence  of  transitional 
and  troublous  times  on  minds  that  gave  promise  of 
noble  work,  and  seemed  called  to  take  their  place 
among  the  leaders  of  religious  thought.  It  is  "  melan- 


■  Works'  (Oxford,  1838),  iii.  p.  435.  t  Hid,  i.  p.  xxiii. 


140  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

choly  but  instructive,"  to  watch  the  oscillations  and 
inconsistencies  of  a  mind  which,  if  not  great,  at  least 
appeared  capable  of  greatness ;  to  see  how  the  man 
who  had  blown  the  trumpet,  as  with  no  uncertain 
sound,  shrank  back,  recoiling  from  the  noise  himself 
had  made ;  how  the  seeker  after  truth  at  thirty  be- 
came at  forty  the  timid,  or  querulous,  or  declamatory 
defender  of  establislied  formulae,  vindicating  his  own 
suspected  orthodoxy  by  denouncing  and  anathematis- 
ing the  heterodoxy  of  others.  We  feel  a  shock  as  we 
unveil  these  infirmities  of  nature  which  we  do  not  feel 
as  we  read  like  language  in  the  writings  of  Laud,  or 
Montague,  or  Sacheverell.  Such  men  speak  accord- 
ins:  to  their  nature  ;  but  better-  thinos  mi^ht  have 
been  hoped  from  Chillingworth,  and  we  may  well 
wee23  when  we  think  that  '^  Atticus  is  he  "  who  has 
thus  left  a  name  to  point  once  more  the  moral  of 
human  weakness.  I,  for  one,  must  own  that  I  cannot 
place  him  among  the  master  spirits  of  the  Church 
of  England,  or  accept  the  judgment  that  "  there  are 
few  names,  even  in  a  history  so  fruitful  in  great 
names  as  that  of  the  Church  of  England,  which 
more  excite  our  admiration,  or  which  claim  a  higher 
place  in  the  development  of  religious  thought."  * 

I  turn  lastly  from  the  writer  to  the  book.  Was  it 
a  master-piece  of  thought,  a  KTij/xa  e?  ael,  such  as  the 
world  will  not  willingly  let  die ;  a  work  to  put  into 


*  Tulloch's  '  Leaders  of  Keligious  Thought,'  I.  p.  343. 


WILLIAM   CHILLIXGWORTH.  141 

the  liauds  of  students  of  theology  as  a  guide  in 
forming  their  convictions  ?  I  confess  that  I  cannot 
bring  myself  to  assign  that  character  to  it.  Looking 
to  its  structural  defects,  the  absence  of  any  other 
plan  than  that  of  following,  step  by  step,  the  tortuous 
windings  of  his  adversary's  argument,  it  can  claim  to 
be  nothing  more  than  an  overgrown  and  enormous 
pamphlet,  with  wellnigh  all  the  faults  incidental 
to  that  form  of  controversial  literature.  It  may  be 
true,  as  Locke  has  said,  that  it  supplies  an  admirable 
training  for  the  logical  powers  of  men  ;  but  it  may  be 
questioned  whether,  even  from  that  point  of  view, 
the  exercises  in  which  it  practises  the  mental 
muscles,  like  the  old  fashioned  fencing  of  the  period 
in  its  action  on  the  muscles  of  the  body,  do  not  tend 
to  a  somewhat  formal  and  artificial  action.  And  the 
man  must  have  a  steadier  footing  and  a  stronger 
brain  than  fall  to  the  lot  of  most  young  students  who 
can  read  the  *  Keligion  of  Protestants '  as  it  ought 
to  be  read,  giving  equal  attention  to  the  arguments 
on  either  side,  without  feeling  more  or  less  puzzled 
and  bewildered.  Physiologists  tell  us  that  there  is 
nothing  that  so  rapidly  brings  on  the  symptoms  of 
intoxication  as  to  take  strong  and  fiery  liquors,  of 
contrasted  tastes  and  qualities,  sip  by  sip,  alternately. 
Men  lose  their  perception  of  the  difference  of  flavour ; 
they  cease  to  distinguish  good  wine  from  bad.  Before 
long  they  stagger  as  a  drunken  man.  And  something 
analogous  to  these   phenomena   is  not   unlikely,  I 


142      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

fear,  to  be  the  result  with  unstable  and  weak  minds 
as  they  take  the  alternate  doses  of  Eomanism  and 
Protestantism  which  Chillingworth's  work  presents 
to  them.  It  may  even  be  doubted  whether  the 
cause  wliich  we  hold  to  be  the  strongest  has  not  on 
the  whole,  in  spite  of  some  telling  and  effective 
passages,  the  less  winning  and  persuasive  advocate. 
There  is  on  the  side  of  the  author  of  '  Charity  Main- 
tained,' as  in  many  writings  of  the  same  school,  a 
confident  assumption  of  certainty ;  a  thoroughgoing 
consistency  in  maintaining  that  assumption ; .  a  half- 
threatening,  half-pitying  argument  in  terrorein,  that 
the  Protestant  who  could  not  plead  invincible  igno- 
rance— and  it  was  of  course  assumed  that  no  one  who 
read  the  argument  could  afterwards  put  in  that 
plea — would,  without  doubt,  perish  everlastingly, 
which  may  prove  as  telling  on  an  unsettled  mind  as 
like  arguments  had  proved  on  Chillingworth  himself. 
He  is  free  from  the  embarrassments  to  which  his 
opponent  is  exposed  by  his  want  of  thoroughness 
and  not  unfrequent  inconsistencies.  In  his  desire 
to  make  a  point,  Chillingworth  really  underrates  the 
evidence  which  the  New  Testament  itself  supplies 
to  a  wide-spread  knowledge  of  our  Lord's  life  and 
teaching,  to  a  well-defined  system  of  faith  and  prac- 
tice and  worship,  before  a  single  Gospel  or  Epistle 
was  in  existence.  He  unduly  disparages  the  weight 
of  the  consensus  of  Christendom  as  to  the  main 
outlines  of  the  faith  contained  in  Scripture  as  well 


WILLIAM   CPIILLINGWOETH.  143 

as  to  the  authority  of  Scri{)ture  itself.  He  has 
no  wide  and  far-reaching  hope  to  set  against 
the  threats  of  his  opponent.  It  is  a  terrible  thing 
for  the  Romanist  to  say  that  Protestants  cannot  be 
saved  except  by  repenting  of  tlieir  errors,  but  he 
has  not  gone  further  than  the  Romanists,  if  so  far, 
in  extending  the  plea  of  ignorance,  and  therefore 
the  hope  of  salvation,  to  the  Jew,  the  heretic,  and 
the  heathen. 

Young  minds  need,  it  seems  to  me,  the  guidance 
of  a  calmer  and  more  evenly  balanced  intellect  than 
that  of  one  who  is  neither  thorough  nor  consistent 
nor  complete  —  whose  whole  life  was  a  series  of 
disputes,  and  oscillations  ending  in  retrogression. 
There  is  too  much  ground,  I  believe,  to  fear  lest 
one  who  was  left  to  the  impressions  formed  by  his 
books  and  by  his  life  might  grow  bewildered  and 
perplexed  with  the  din  of  endless  controversies, 
and  that  at  last,  weary  of  the  strife  of  tongues,  he 
might  be  tempted,  as  nobler  intellects  than  Chilling- 
worth  have  in  our  own  time  been  tempted,  to  take 
that  fatal  leap  in  the  dark  which  has  been  well 
described  as  a  flight  "  on  the  wings  of  an  un- 
bounded scepticism  into  the  depths  of  an  unfa- 
thomed  superstition."* 


*  The  sentence  occurs  in  a 
Charge  delivered  to  Candidates 
for  Orders  in  1846,  by  the  late 
Bishop  Wilberforce,  ia  reference 


to  the  conversion  of  Dr.  John 
Henry  Newman  to  the  Church 
of  Rome. 


144  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH    THEOLOGY: 

No  ;  there  is  a  more  excellent  way  than  these  inter- 
minable debates,  postulating  infallibility  on  either 
side,  on  the  conflicting  claims  of  Scripture  and  of  the 
Church.  It  is  at  once  our  right  and  our  duty,  find- 
ing ourselves  in  face  of  both  as  actual  phenomena, 
worthy,  by  the  part  which  they  have  played  in  the 
world's  history,  and  by  the  influence  they  have  exer- 
cised and  are  exercising  now,  of  all  serious  considera- 
tion, to  ask  what  Scripture  really  is,  to  trace  what 
the  Church  of  Christ  has  actually  done,  what  aspects 
of  truth  have  been  presented  to  mankind  by  each, 
through  wliat  stages  of  growth  each  has  been  de- 
veloped. If,  as  has  been  the  case  with  most  of  us,  we 
have  felt  ourselves,  or  have  seen  in  others,  the  power 
of  Scripture,  or  of  fellowship  in  the  Communion  of 
Saints,  to  purify  and  bless,  to  comfort  and  to  calm, 
that  experience,  tliough  it  is  no  bar  to  the  full 
freedom  of  inquiry,  is  yet  an  element  of  evidence 
which  we  cannot  rightly  or  wisely  ignore.  "  Suffi- 
cient unto  the  day  is  the  evil  thereof,"  and  the  con- 
troversies of  our  own  times  are  surely  enough,  and 
more  than  enough,  for  us,  without  raking  overmuch 
into  the  dust  and  ashes,  the  mouldering  bones  and  rags, 
of  the  controversies  of  the  past.  Our  last  words  of 
counsel  for  the  student  of  religious  thought,  in  rela- 
tion to  Chillingworth  and  the  writings  with  which 
his  name  is  identified,  may  well  be,  after  the  pattern 
of  those  which  were  spoken  of  old  to  the  waver- 
ing disciple,  "  Let  the  dead  bury  their  dead ;  but 


WILLIAM  CHILLING WOETH.  145 

go  thou  and  preach  the  Kingdom  of  God."  Let 
pamphleteer  wrangle  with  pamphleteer ;  but  go 
thou,  and  study,  faithfully  and  patiently,  boldly 
and  yet  reverentially,  reverentially  and  yet  boldly, 
the  Books  which  have  made  Christendom  what 
it  is,  and  the  Christendom  which  the  Books  have 
made. 


[king's  coll.] 


BENJAMIN  WHICHCOTE. 


Born  1609;  Died  1683;  Buried  at  St.  Lawrence  Jewry.* 


Whichcote's  central  principle,  the  essential  unity  of  all  truth  and 
its  aflQnity  to  the  constitution  of  man  (1),  opposed  to  contempo- 
rary English  thought  (2). 

His  historical  position  explains  the  stress  which  he  laid  upon  action 
(3).     Traits  of  his  life  (4).     His  Remains  (5). 

The  "  truths  of  first  inscription  "  witness  to  man's  true  destiny  as 
made  for  God  (6).  Sin  is  unnatural  (7) :  and  carries  with  it 
consequences  like  itself  (8). 

Hence  nature  leaves  us  with  a  final  conflict  (9),  which  the  "  truths 
of  after  revelation"  solve  (10). 

At  the  same  time  revelation  appeals  to  reason  (11)  and  completely 
satisfies  it  (12).  Hence  comes  the  duty  of  personal  inquiry  (13) 
and  of  gaining  solid  conviction  in  matters  of  religion  (14);  for 
which  work  God  has  given  us  powers  which  we  are  bound  to 
use  (15). 


*  The  edition  of  the  Sermons 
to  which  reference  is  made  is 
that  published  at  Aberdeen,  in 
3751,  4  vols.  The  references  are 
given  by  volume  and  page  (e.g. 
i.  371).  The  aphorisms  and  let- 
ters are  quoted  from  the  edition 
published  in  London,  1753.  The 
references  to  the  aphorisms  are 
given  by  the  number  (e.g.  A. 
916).  It  would  have  been  easy 
to  multiply  references,  but  I 
do  not  think  that  one  has  been 
given  which  will  not  amply  re- 


pay   the    trouble    of   examina- 
tion. 

It  may  be  added  that  there  is  a 
characteristic  portrait  of  Which- 
cote  in  the  Hall  of  Emmanuel 
College,  Cambridge.  His  face, 
tender  and  half-sad  in  expres- 
sion, has  much  of  tliat  refine- 
ment of  feature  which  is  con- 
spicuous in  George  Herbert. 
The  portrait  offers  a  strange 
contrast  to  those  near  which  it  is 
hung.  I  have  not  been  able  to 
learn  anything  of  its  history. 

L   2 


148  MASTERS   IN    ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

In  ihis  way  action  and  thought  act  and  react  (16) ;  and  character 
is  sh)wly  formed  (17)  ;  and  the  ground  of  our  future  is  certainly 
laid  (18)  both  as  regards  punishment  (19)  and  happiness  (20). 

Whichcote  deprecates  exactness  of  dogmatic  definition  (21).  His 
judgment  on  '  mere  naturalists '  (22 ). 

His  thoughts  essentially  modern  (23)  and  more  comprehensiye 
than  tljose  of  succeeding  schools  (24);  but  his  influence  was 
mainly  confined  to  his  contemporaries  (25). 

His  defects  (26)  not  inherent  in  his  great  principles  (27) ;  while  he 
accepted  the  teaching  of  the  Holy  Spirit  in  each  age  (28). 


1.  "  The  Spirit  of  man  is  the  candle  of  the  Lord."  * 
This  phrase,  "  over-frequently  quoted "  by  Which- 
cote, as  his  opponents  alleged,  at  once  brings  before 
us  the  central  characteristic  of  his  teaching;'.  For 
him  reason  was  "lighted  by  God  and  lighting 
us  to  God,  res  illuminata,  illuminans!' "^  ''What," 
he  asks,  "  doth  God  speak  to  but  my  reason  ?  and 
should  not  that  which  is  spoken  to  hear?  should 
it  not  judge,  discern,  conceive,  what  is  God's  mean- 
ing ?  "  J  *'  I  count  it  true  sacrilege  to  take  from  God 
to  give  to  the  creature,  yet  I  look  at  it  as  a  dis- 
honouring of  God  to  nullify  and  make  base  His 
works,  and  to  think  He  made  a  sorry,  worthless 
piece,  fit  for  no  use,  when  He  made  man."§ 
"Truth  is  so  near  to  the  soul,  so  much  the  very 
image  and  form  of  it,  that  it  may  be  said  of  truth, 
that  as  the  soul  is  by  derivation  from  God,  so  truth 
by  communication.      No  sooner  doth  the  truth  of 


*  Prov.  XX.  27.  I      X  Letters,  p.  48. 

t  A.  916.     Comp.  i.  371.  I      §  Letters,  p.  112. 


BENJAMIN    WHICHCOTE.  149 

God  come  into  the  soul's  sight,  but  tlie  soul  knows 
her  to  be  her  first  and  old  acquaintance.  Though 
they  have  been  by  some  accident  unhappily  parted 
a  great  while,  yet,  having  now  through  the  Divine 
Providence  happily  met,  they  greet  one  another 
and  renew  their  acquaintance  as  those  that  were 
first  and  ancient  friends.  .  .  .  Nothing  is  more 
natural  to  man's  soul  than  to  receive  truth.  .  .  ."* 
In  this  respect  the  grand  articles  of  the  Gospel 
are  as  natural  as  the  precepts  of  the  moral  law. 
"  When  the  revelation  of  faith  comes,  the  inward 
sense  awakened  to  the  entertainment  thereof,  saith 
Evp7]Ka.  It  is,  as  I  imagined :  the  thing  expected 
proves :  Christ  the  desire  of  all  nations ;  that  is, 
the  desire  of  their  state :  at  least  the  necessity  of 
their  state."  f 

2.  By  this  bold  affirmation  of  the  unity  of  Truth, 
natural  and  revealed,  which  be  held  to  differ  only 
*'  in  way  of  descent  to  us,"  and  to  be  equally  "  conna- 
tural "  to  man,t  corresponding  in  various  ways  to  his 
complex  and  yet  indivisible  being,  appealing  alike 
to  the  "  testimony  of  the  soul,  naturally  Christian," 
Whichcote  traversed  the  one  conclusion  in  which  the 
most  powerful  representatives  of  English  thought  in 
his  day  were  united.  Bacon  and  Hobbes,  Puritans 
and  Prelatists,   agreed  in  treating  philosophy  and 


*  iii.  17  f.    Comp.  i.  353.  I      %  i\L    20.      A.  444.    iii.   213, 

t  Letters,  p.  102.  1  388. 


150      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

religion  as  tilings  wholly  different  in  kind.  The  ex- 
treme schools  on  each  side  concurred  in  "  wounding 
virtue,"  in  "  destroying"  the  belief  of  any  immediate 
good  or  happiness  in  it  as  a  thing  in  any  way  suit- 
able to  our  make  and  constitution.*  Against  both 
Whichcote  stood  forth,  in  the  plirase  of  Lord  Shaftes- 
bury, who  appreciated  one  half  of  his  teaching,  as 
"  the  preacher  of  good-nature ; "  yet  so  that  he  never 
contemplated  man  apart  from  God,  "  abhorring  and 
detesting,"  in  his  own  vigorous  words  "  all  creature- 
magnifying  self-sufficiency."  t 

3.  Whichcote's  historical  position  illustrates  the 
development  of  his  principles ;  and  his  life  is  a  com- 
mentary on  their  power.  The  vigour  of  his  manhood 
was  passed  in  a  period  of  revolution  in  which  every 
opinion  and  institution  wdiich  had  been  held  sacred  in 
the  past  was  questioned  or  overthrown.  He  saw  the 
rise  of  a  new  philosophy,  of  a  new  civil  constitution, 
of  a  new  ecclesiastical  organisation  ;  and  in  part  he 
saw  the  old  restored.  At  Cambridge  he  was  the  con- 
temporary of  Milton  and  Jeremy  Taylor,  and  again 
of  Barrow  and  Kay.  The  date  of  his  ordination  coin- 
cided with  that  of  the  imposition  of  the  ship-money 
(1636),  and  fell  a  year  before  the  appearance  of 
Descartes'  'Discourse.'  His  controversy  with  Tuck- 
ney  coincided  with  the  Battle  of  Worcester  and  the 
publication  of  Hobbes'  *  Leviathan'  (1656).  His  death 


Shaftesbury,  Preface,  pp.  vii.  f.  f  Letters,  pp.  100,  58. 


BENJAMIN  WHICHCOTE.  151 

coincided  with  the  execution  of  Lord  W.  Eussell 
and  the  Oxford  declaration  in  favour  of  passive  obe- 
dience (1683).  In  such  an  age  a  serious  thinker, 
removed  from  the  turmoil  of  affairs,  could  not  but 
look  earnestly  for  some  stable  foundation  for  life. 
Controversy  had  issued  in  an  anarchy  of  sects. 
Authority  had  been  invoked  on  opposite  sides 
with  peremptory  sternness.  Enthusiasts  had  ven- 
tured to  claim  for  their  extravagances  the  title  of 
inspiration.  Theology,  systematised  with  logical 
precision  in  the  Westminster  Confession,  had  failed 
to  cover  or  to  meet  the  actual  facts  of  daily 
experience.  It  was  not  strange  then  that  one  whose 
work  was  in  the  Eastern  University  should  attempt 
once  more  to  look  fairly  at  **  all  reasons,"  to  co-ordi- 
nate the  conflicting  phenomena  which  he  regarded 
from  afar ;  not  strange  that  he  should  find  the  test 
of  truth  which  he  required  in  character  and  conduct. 
For  Whichcote  truth  was  the  soul  of  action.  '*  I  act, 
therefore  I  am,"*  was  the  memorable  sentence  in 
which  he  echoed  and  answered  the  cogito  ergo  sum  of 
Descartes.  But  I  act  not  as  my  own  maker,  not  as 
my  own  sustainer,  but  as  the  creature  and  servant  of 
Him  who  is  original  of  all  and  will  be  final  to  all ; 
who  is  "to  be  adored  as  the  chiefest  beauty  and 
loved  as  the  first  and  chiefest  good,"  who  hath 
given   us  '*a   large  capacity  which   He  will  fulfil, 


iii.  241. 


152  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

and  a  special  relation  to  Himself,  which   He  will 
answer."* 

4.  The  life  of  Whiehcote  was,  as  I  have  said,  a 
happy  commentary  on  his  principles.  Calm,  firm, 
large-hearted  and  loving,  he  passed  through  sharp 
controversies  without  losing  a  friend ;  he  accepted 
a  dignity — the  Provostship  of  King's  College — of 
which  another  was  deprived,  and  was  himself  dis- 
placed from  it,  without  diminishing  his  reputation. 
Through  all  changes  he  held  on  his  own  way ;  a 
thinker  rather  than  a  reader  in  an  age  pre-eminent 
for  learning ;  a  believer  in  the  present  in  a  society 
devoted  to  the  past.  Trained,  as  it  appears,  in  a 
Puritan  family,  entered  at  Cambridge  in  the 
Puritan  foundation  of  Emmanuel  College,  acknow- 
ledging with  affection  his  obligations  to  his  Puritan 
tutor,  he  ventured  to  judge  for  himself,  even  as 
a  young  man,!  without  affecting  isolation  in  the 
maturity  of  his  power.  "  I  have  had  experience," 
he  answers  Tuckney,  "  of  that  frame  of  spirit  in 
the  former  part  of  my  life,  and  ...  I  can  no  more 
look  back  than  St.  Paul,  after  Christ  discovered 
to  him,  could  return  into  his  former  strain."  f  As  a 
College  lecturer,  he  turned  aside  from  Protestant 
Scholasticism  "  to  Philosophy  and  Metaphysics."  §  As 
Vice-Chancellor  he  deliberately  justified  his  choice. 

*  ii.  61 ;  94.  f  Letters,  p.  12.  %  Letters,  p.  115. 

§  Letters,  p.  36. 


BENJAMIN   WHICHCOTE.  153 

Yet  even  here  he  sought  guidance  within  rather  than 
without.  "  Truly,  I  shame  myself  to  tell,"  he  writes, 
"how little  I  have  been  acquainted  with  books.  .  .  . 
I  have  not  read  many  books,  but  I  have  studied  a  few. 
Meditation  and  invention  hath  been  rather  my  life 
than  reading."  *  So  it  was  that  alone  of  his  equals  he 
published  nothing.  His  influence  was  in  personal 
intercourse,  in  preaching  and  conversation.  Keady 
to  learn  even  to  the  last,  gladly  confessing  that  no 
man  gains  so  much  as  by  teaching,t  he  was  able  to 
sympathise  with  the  "  young  scholars  "  who  flocked 
to  hear  him,  and  with  the  "  young  divines,"  of  whom 
he  was  "a  great  encourager  and  kind  director." J 
In  such  traits  the  true  teacher  rises  before  us,  tender 
in  his  patience  and  strong  in  his  wisdom,  of  whom 
his  greater  pupil  Smith  could  say  that  "he  lived 
upon  him."§ 

5.  The  only  writings  of  Whichcote  which  have  been 
preserved  in  a  complete  form  are  four  letters  to  his 
old  tutor.  Dr.  Tuckney,  which  deal  with  the  main 
points  in  which  he  was  at  issue  with  "orthodox" 
Puritanism :  "  The  use  of  reason  in  religion,  the 
differences  of  opinion  among  Christians,  the  recon- 
ciliation of  sinners  unto  God,  the  studies  and  learninir 
of  a  minister  of  the  Gospel."    A  considerable  number 


*  Letters,  p.  54. 

t  iii.  90. 

X  Tillotson's  '  Funeral  Sermon,'  pp.  32,  24,  33,  31. 

§  Aphorisms,  Pre/,  p.  xviii. 


154  MASTEKS  IN  ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

of  his  Sermons  were  published  after  his  death,  partly 
from  notes  of  his  hearers  and  partly  from  his  own 
notes ;  and  besides  these,  twelve  centuries  of  "  aphor- 
isms" were  taken  from  his  papers,  of  which  the  greater 
part  are  found  literally  or  substantially  in  his  other 
remains.  But  though  these  materials  are  frag- 
mentary and  in  part  confused,  it  is  not  difficult  to 
gain  a  clear  and  connected  view  of  his  system.  His 
frequent  repetitions,  his  bright  epigrams,  his  earnest 
simplicity,  bring  his  main  thoughts  vividly  before 
the  reader ;  for  when  he  spoke  from  the  pulpit  he 
appears  to  have  laid  aside  the  technical  forms  which 
sometimes  on  other  occasions  provoked  the  criticism 
of  his  contemporaries. 

6.  The  foundation  of  Whichcote's  teaching  is  the 
postulate  or  axiom  that  man  was  made  by  Grod  to 
know  Him,  and  to  become  like  Him.  Of  this  truth 
man,  he  affirms,  is  himself  the  witness.  "  God  is  the 
centre  of  immortal  souls."  .  .  .  '*If  God  had  not 
made  man  to  know  there  is  a  God,  there  is  nothing 
that  God  could  have  demanded  of  him,  nothing 
wherein  He  might  have  challenged  him,  nothing  that 
He  could  have  expected  man  should  have  received 
of  Him."  *  As  it  is  "  the  truths  of  first  inscription," 
as  Whichcote  calls  them ;  "  the  light  of  God's  crea- 
tion ;"  "  the  true  issue  of  reason ;"  the  facts  that  God 
is ;  that  every  fellow-man,  as  man,  claims  our  respect ; 


*  iii.  144. 


BENJAMIN  WHICHCOTE.  155 

that  every  man  must  reverence  himself;  or,  in  other 
words,  the  three  duties  of  godliness,  righteousness, 
and  sobriety,  are,  he  shows,  such  that  you  must 
unmake  man  if  you  deny  them.*  Truth  and  good- 
ness, riglit  and  justice,  are  a  law  with  God,  unchange- 
able as  He  is.  The  reasons  of  things  are  eternal ; 
they  are  not  subject  to  our  power ;  we  practise  not 
upon  them.  *'  They  are  as  much  our  rule  as  sense 
is  to  sensitives,  or  the  nature  of  things  to  inani- 
mates." It  is  our  wisdom  to  observe  them,  and 
our  uprightness  to  comply  with  them.  If  we  think 
otherwise  than  they  require,  we  live  in  a  lie.f 

7.  So  far  we  remain  as  we  were  created.  For  the 
Fall  has  not  altered  the  destination  of  man  nor 
obliterated  his  knowledge  of  it.  "The  idolatry 
of  the  world,"  as  Whichcote  profoundly  remarks, 
"hath  been  about  the  medium  of  worship,  not 
about  the  object  of  worship."!  The  testimony  of 
conscience — our  "  home-G-od,"  as  he  calls  it  § — still 
remains.  Great  hopes  and  great  aspirations  contend 
in  the  human  heart  with  the  sense  of  weakness 
and  failure.  Sin,  however  familar,  is  "  unnatural," 
"contrary  to  the  reason  of  the  mind  which  is 
our  governor,  and  contrary  to  the  reason  of  things 
which  is  our  law."     Wrong-doing  is  evil,  not  only 


111. 


22  ff;    120  f.     A.  630,    i.  149, 386,  253.   ii,  397.    A.  157, 


126,211,989.     iii,  422. 

t  i.  68,  71.    A.  258.     Comp. 
116,257,333,455,  456.    iii.  92; 


797.    iii.  91,  372,  387  f. 
X  iii.  202. 
§  i.  40.    Comp.  A.  1092. 


156  MASTEES   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

because  God  has  forbidden  it,  but  by  its  intrinsic 
malignity.* 

8.  These  truths  involve,  as  it  is  evident,  conse- 
quences of  infinite  moment.  The  results  of  actions 
are  like  the  actions  themselves.  Sin  carries  with  it 
inevitably  the  seeds  of  misery  ;  virtue  the  seeds  of 
joy.  For  happiness  and  misery  hereafter  are  not 
simple  effects  of  Divine  power  and  pleasure ;  they 
have  a  foundation  in  nature.f  It  is  impossible  to 
make  a  man  happy  by  putting  him  into  a  happy 
place  unless  he  be  first  in  a  happy  state.  J  "  Heaven," 
as  he  tersely  says,  "is  first  a  temper  and  then  a 
place." §  "  Heaven  present  is  our  resemblance  to  God, 
and  men  deceive  themselves  grossly  when  they  flatter 
themselves  with  the  hopes  of  a  future  heaven,  and 
yet  do,  by  wickedness  of  heart  and  life,  contradict 
heaven  present."  ||  So  far  therefore  as  man  has  lost 
the  Divine  image,  happiness  for  him  is  inherently 
impossible. 

9.  Here,  then,  by  the  contemplation  of  the  original 
facts  of  nature,  we  are  brought  face  to  face  with  the 
great  enigma  of  life.  How  can  man,  fallen,  sin- 
stained,  estranged  from  God,  gain  his  true  end  ? 
The  "  truths  of  first  inscription  "  witness  inexorably 
against  him.     Whichcote  points  to  the  answer  which 


*  i.  212;  iv.  192.  A.  212,523. 
ii.  397.    A.  918. 
t  ii.  198. 


X  A.  216. 
§  A.  464. 
11  ii.  196.     Cornp.  iv.  255. 


BENJAMIN   WHICHCOTE.  157 

lies  in  the  "  truths  of  after  revelation."  These  are 
*'  the  soul's  cure."*  By  them  we  are  assured  of  for- 
giveness upon  repentance  and  faith  in  Christ,  and  of 
needful  help  in  the  struggle  of  life ;  things  credible 
indeed,  yet  such  tliat  nothing  short  of  the  Mission  of 
the  Son  of  God  could  have  established  them  solidly. 

10.  By  this  Mission,  God  has  re-established  His 
loving  purpose.  The  light  of  reason  is  supplemented 
by  the  light  of  Scripture.f  To  use  the  former  is  to  do 
no  disservice  to  grace,  for  God  is  acknowledged  in 
both;  in  the  former,  as  laying  the  groundwork  of 
His  creation ;  in  the  latter,  as  restoring  it. J  And 
this  second  gift  is  as  universal  and  as  real  as  the 
first.  "  When  God  commands  the  sinner  to  repent, 
this  supposes  either  that  he  is  able,  or  that  God  will 
make  him  so."  § 

11 .  It  is  unnecessary  to  examine  Whichcote's  views 
on  atonement,  mediation,  grace,  repentance,  faith, 
justification,  though  they  are  full  of  striking  points. 
The  characteristic  features  of  his  teaching  are  better 
shown  by  the  emphasis  with  which  he  claims  to 
bring  these  doctrines  of  Scripture  to  the  test  of 
reason,  and  affirms  their  complete  harmony  with  it. 
"  \Ye  must  be  men,"  he  writes,  "  before  we  can  be 
Christians."  ||  "  The  reason  is  the  only  tool  with  which 
we  can  do  man's  work.H     If  God  did  not  make  my 


*  iii 

.20. 

§ 

A. 

516, 

811 

t  A. 

109, 

778, 

920. 

11 

A 

997. 

X  i- 

371. 

t 

ii. 

407. 

158  MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

faculties  true,  I  am  absolutely  discharged  from  all 
duty  to  Him.*  For  a  man  hath  not  a  sovereignty 
over  his  judgment ;  he  must  judge  and  believe  where 
he  sees  cause  and  reason.f  The  reason  of  a  man's 
mind  must  be  satisfied ;  no  man  can  think  against 
it.  {  But  they  are  greatly  mistaken,"  he  argues, 
"who  in  religion  oppose  points  of  reason  and 
matters  of  faith ;  as  if  nature  went  one  way  and 
the  Author  of  nature  went  another."  §  The  facts 
and  the  commands  of  the  Gospel  equally  answer  to 
our  constitution. 

12.  In  virtue  of  this  absolute  correspondence  be- 
tween Christianity  and  the  soul,  revealed  truths  are 
seen  to  be  transcendent,  but  not  repugnant  to  the 
nature  of  man.  ||  *'  Though  they  be  not  of  reason's 
invention,  yet  they  are  of  the  prepared  mind  readily 
entertained  and  received  "  IF  .  .  .  "  For  men  are  dis- 
posed and  qualified  by  reason  for  the  entertaining 
those  matters  of  faith  that  are  proposed  by  God."  ** 
So  false  is  it  that  the  matter  of  our  faith  is  un- 
accountable, or  that  there  is  anything  unreasonable 
in  religion,  that  there  is  no  such  matter  of  credit  in 
the  world  as  the  matters  of  faith;  nothing  more 
intelligible.ft  "  Nowhere  is  a  man's  reason  so  much 
satisfied."  J  J  If  he  be  '*  once  in  a  true  state  of  religion, 


*  i.  170.  t  iii.  216. 

X  iv.  201 ;  ii.  29.    A.  942. 
§  A.  878.  II  ii.  302. 

t  Letters,  p.  47. 


**  A.  644.  Comp.  99. 
tt  iii.  23  f. ;  1.  71,  174. 
XX  A.  943. 


BENJAMIN   WHICHCOTE.  159 

be  cannot  distinguish  between  religion  and  the 
reason  of  bis  mind  ;  so  that  bis  religion  is  tbe  reason 
of  bis  mind,  and  tbe  reason  of  bis  mind  is  bis  re- 
ligion. .  .  .  His  reason  is  sanctified  by  bis  religion 
and  bis  religion  belps  and  makes  use  of  bis  reason. 
Keason  and  religion  in  the  subject  are  but  one 
tbing.  ..."  *  "  Tbis  I  dare  defend  against  tbe  wbole 
world,  tbat  there  is  no  one  thing  in  all  that  religion 
which  is  of  God's  making,  that  any  sober  man  in 
tbe  true  use  of  bis  reason  would  be  released  from, 
though  he  might  have  it  under  the  seal  of  heaven."  f 
The  obligation  to  truth  is  perfect  freedom.  J  Tbe 
vision  of  tbe  Lord  in  glory  to  8t.  Paul  was  not  more 
convincing  than  tbe  exhibition  of  the  Gospel  to  the 
soul.  §  On  the  other  hand,  no  sign  can  warrant  our 
belief  unless  it  be  in  conjunction  with  a  doctrine 
worthy  of  God.  ||  "  And  to  me  it  seems,"  Whichcote 
says,  with  stern  indignation,  "  to  be  one  of  tbe 
greatest  prodigies  in  the  world  that  men  that  are 
rational  and  intelligent  should  admit  that  for 
religion,  which  for  its  shallowness,  emptiness,  and 
insignificancy,  falls  under  tbe  just  reproof  and 
conviction  and  condemnation  of  reason;  religion 
which  makes  us  less  men ;  religion  unintelligible, 
or  not  able  to  give  satisfaction  to  the  noble  prin- 
ciples of  God's  creation."  T[ 


* 

iv. 

147. 

§ 

iii. 

88. 

t 

iv. 

193. 

Comp.  ii.  140. 

11 

A. 

1177 

X 

iv. 

339. 

A.  205,  724,  725. 

•If 

iii. 

249. 

160  MASTEKS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

13.  Our  reason,  therefore,  "is  not  laid  aside  nor 
discharged,  much  less  is  it  confounded  by  any  of 
the  materials  of  religion ;  but  awakened,  excited, 
employed,  directed,  and  improved  by  it ;  for  the 
.  .  .  understanding  is  that  faculty  whereby  man  is 
made  capable  of  God  and  apprehensive  of  Him, 
receptive  from  Him  and  able  to  make  returns 
upon  Him.*  .  .  ."  Keligion  is  the  living  sum  of 
these  manifold  activities.  It  is  not  "  made  up  of 
ignorant  well-meanings  or  .  .  .  slight  imaginations, 
credulous  suspicion  or  fond  conceit " ;  that  is 
superstition ;  "  but  of  deliberate  resolutions  and 
diligent  searches  into  the  reason  of  things,  and  into 
the  rational  sense  of  Holy  Scripture."  t  We  must 
then  study  it  till  the  reason  of  our  minds  receives 
satisfaction  ;  for  till  then  we  cannot  count  it  our 
own,  nor  has  it  security  and  settlement,  if  We  must 
have  a  reason  for  that  which  we  believe  above  our 
reason.  §  It  is  the  peculiarity  of  human  nature  that 
man,  through  the  reason  of  his  mind,  can  come  to 
understand  the  reason  of  things ;  and  there  is  no 
coming  to  religion  but  this  way.  ||  The  riches  of 
earth  can  be  left  and  inherited ;  the  wealth  of  the 
soul  must  be  won.^ 

14.  Thus  there  is  laid  upon  every  one,  according  to 


*  iv.  139  f. 

t  iv.  151. 

I  iv.  149.     A.  1089.     iv.  292. 


§  A.  771. 

II  iv.  142. 

t  iv.  141. 


BENJAMIN  WHICHCOTE.  101 

tbe  measure  of  Lis  opportunity,  the  duty  of  personal 
inquiry.  To  neglect  this  is  to  incur  the  guilt  of 
superstition,  or  insincerity,  or  self-conceit.*  The  use 
of  private  judgment  requires,  no  doubt,  far  more 
preparation  and  diligence  than  men  commonly 
suppose,  a  larger  comprehension  of  facts,  a  more 
patient  weighing  of  deductions  ;  but  it  is  a  funda- 
mental duty. t  "If  you  see  not  well,"  Whichcote 
writes,  "  hear  the  better :  if  you  see  not  far,  hear  the 
more.  The  consequence  of  truth  is  great ;  therefore 
the  judgment  of  it  must  not  be  negligent."  t  "  He  that 
believes  what  God  saith  without  evidence  that  God 
says  it,  doth  not  believe  God,  while  he  believes  the 
thing  which  comes  from  God."  §  By  a  natural  re- 
action, "  he  that  is  light  of  belief  will  be  as  light 
of  unbelief ;"  §  and  "  of  all  impotencies  in  the  world 
credulity  in  religion  is  the  greatest."  %  "  It  doth 
not,  then,  become  a  Christian  to  be  credulous."** 
He  must  make  it  his  business  to  set  up  a  throne 
of  judgment  in  his  own  soul ;  for  that  is  "  not  an  act 
of  religion  which  is  not  an  act  of  the  understanding ; 
that  is  not  an  act  of  religion  which  is  not  even 
human."  ft 

15.  In  virtue  of  this  continuous  obligation  we  work 
from  first  to  last,  and  God  also  works.     Belief  and 


*  ii.387;  iv.  337flf. 

!               11  A.  292. 

t  ii.  38.    A.  622.    iii.  416. 

t  iv.  143. 

X  A.  1090. 

**  iii.  114. 

§  A.  977.                                      1 

ft  i.  151  f. 

157. 

[king's  coll.] 

M 

162  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

repentance  are  vital  acts.*  The  selfsame  thing  that 
is  in  us  called  virtue,  as  it  refers  to  God,  is  grace,  f 
It  is  far  from  true  that  man  hath  nothing  to  do  upon 
supposition  that  God  hath  done  all.  t  Nay,  rather 
by  the  appropriation  of  His  gifts  our  noblest  powers 
find  their  noblest  exercise ;  and  it  ill  becomes  us 
to  make  our  intellectual  faculties  '^  Gibeonites  " — in 
Whichcote's  picturesque  phrase — mere  drudges  for 
the  meanest  services  of  the  world.  §  The  rule  of  their 
employment  even  now  should  be  their  future  destiny  : 
the  law  of  heaven  should  be  the  law  of  the  world.  || 
Can  any  man  think,  he  asks,  that  God  gave  him 
his  immortal  spirit  as  salt,  only  to  keep  his  body  from 
decay  ?  U  Nay,  he  that  is  in  a  good  state  hath  still 
work  to  do.**  '•  God,  who  hath  made  us  what  we  are, 
would  have  us  employ  and  improve  what  we  have. 
Faculties  without  any  acquired  habits  witness  for 
God  and  condemn  us  ;"  tt  and  in  spiritual  things  the 
paradox  is  true,  that  what  is  not  used  is  not  had.  XX 

16.  Such  reflections  serve  to  indicate  the  close  rela- 
tion between  thought  and  action,  on  which  Whichcote 
lays  great  stress.  "  I  have  always  found,"  he  writes, 
*'such  preaching  of  others  hath  most  commanded 
my  heart  which  hath  most  illuminated  my  head."  §§ 


*  i.  70.    iii.  87. 

t  iii.  147. 

t  ii.  205. 

**  A.  564. 

X  A.  179. 

tt  A.  1088 

§  iii.  186,  220,  323. 

%X  A.  lUL 

11  iv.  435. 

§§  A.  393. 

BENJAMIN  WHICHCOTE.  163 

Reason  and  argument  are  transforming  principles  in 
intellectual  natures.*  True  knowledge  involves  of 
necessity  a  right  affection  towards  the  things  known  ; 
for  knowledge  unfulfilled  is  the  most  troublesome 
guest  that  can  be  entertained.f  Or,  to  take  another 
figure :  Truth  is  a  seminal  principle  in  the  mind 
which  must  bring  forth  fruit  unless  it  be  killed,  t 
Therefore,  he  says,  to  give  one  application,  as 
thou  art  a  Christian,  take  up  this  resolution,  that  it 
shall  be  better  for  every  one  with  whom  thou 
hast  to  do,  because  Christ  died  for  thee  and  for 
him.  §  And  to  sum  up  all  in  one  pregnant  sen- 
tence :  "  When  the  doctrine  of  the  Gospel  becomes 
the  reason  of  our  mind,  it  will  be  the  principle  of 
our  life."  II 

17.  So  it  is  by  action  answering  to  knowledge  that 
character  is  slowdy  shaped  according  to  an  inevitable 
law.  That  which  is  worldly  in  respect  of  the  matter 
can  be  made  spiritual  through  the  intention  of  the 
agent.lF  For  religion  is  able  to  possess  and  affect  the 
whole  man,  and  bring  that  unity  to  his  conflicting 
powers  whereby  he  gains  the  chiefest  of  good  things 
that  he  is  himself,  his  true  self.**  In  this  respect 
"  we  have  ourselves  as  we  use  ourselves."  ff  We  are 
not  born  with  habits,  but  only  with  faculties.     "  We 


*  iv.  175. 

II  A.  94.    Comp.  132 

t  iii.  61. 

t  A.  520. 

t  iii.  211. 

**  A.  956. 

§  iv.  45. 

ft  A.  341.     iii.  224. 

M   2 

164      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

are  so  in  act  as  we  are  in  habit,  and  so  in  liabit  as 
we  are  in  act."  *  Thouo-hts  of  God  and  thinojs 
divine  mightily  enlarge  the  parts  of  men ;  on  the 
contrary,  men's  parts  Avither  away  if  they  be  not 
excited  and  called  forth  to  nobler  acts  by  higher 
objects.  The  mind,  as  a  glass,  receives  all  images ; 
and  the  soul  becomes  that  with  which  it  is  in  con- 
junction, t 

18.  This  law  of  correspondence  is  universal,  and 
of  immediate  efficacy ;  but  in  our  present  state  the 
true  issues  of  action  are  often  obscured  or  hidden. 
Hereafter,  however,  all  will  be  made  plain.  Judg- 
ment is  a  revelation  of  character:  punishment  is 
the  unchecked  stream  of  consequence.  Every  man 
may  estimate  his  future  state  by  his  present.  He 
will  then  be  more  of  the  same,  or  the  same  more 
intensely.  Therefore  "there  must  be  salvation  of 
grace  as  antecedent  to  that  of  glory.  .  .  .  otherwise 
there  is  no  salvation."  "  The  unrighteous  are  con- 
demned by  themselves  before  they  are  condemned  of 
God."     A  guilty  conscience  hath  hell  within  itself,  t 

19.  Such  a  line  of  argument  throws  light  upon  the 
warnings  of  the  Gospels.  It  shows  that  impenitence 
in  its  very  essence  is  not  compassionable.  Kepent- 
ance  is  the  moral  correlative  to  forgiveness.  An 
impenitent  sinner  cannot  be  pardoned,  because  God 


*  iii.  339 ;  i.  43  ;  iv.  317.  I      $  A.  188.  i.  321,  244.  A.  232. 

t  iv.  318.    A.  366.  I  ii.  198. 


BENJAMIN   WHICHCOTE.  1G5 

cannot  contradict  Himself.*  He  cannot  be  recon- 
ciled to  unrigliteousness ;  and  the  impenitent  ^^ill 
not  be  reconciled  to  rigliteousness.t  "  Though  God 
should  tell  me  my  sins  were  pardoned,"  Whichcote 
boldly  says,  "  I  would  not  believe  it,  unless  I  repent 
and  deprecate  His  displeasure.''^  For  this  reason 
he  maintained  with  energetic  distinctness  that  the 
work  of  Clirist  must  be  "  wrought  not  only  for  us 
but  in  us."  §  "  All  the  world,"  he  writes,  "  will  not 
secure  that  man  that  is  not  in  reconciliation  with  the 
reason  of  his  own  mind."  ||  "It  is  not  possible  we 
should  be  made  happy  by  God  Himself  if  not 
reconciled  to  Him.  ...  If  w^e  through  the  Spirit 
of  God  be  not  naturalized  to  Him,  we  shall  glory 
but  in  an  ineffectual  Saviour."  T[ 

20.  The  application  of  the  same  moral  law  confirms 
also  man's  expectations  of  future  happiness.  The 
feeble  strivings  after  God  which  have  been  made  on 
earth  gain  their  consummation  in  heaven.  When  we 
are  born  into  time,  that  makes  a  great  difference  f* 
but  born  out  of  time  into  eternity  makes  a  far  greater. 
In  our  present  state  it  is  through  the  thought  of  God 
that  we  come  to  know  the  powers  of  our  souls.  He, 
their  one  proper  object,  calls  them  into  activity. 
The  soul  of  man  is  to  God  as  the  flower  to  the  sun  : 
it  opens  at  His  approach  and  shuts  when  He  with- 


A.  840.         t  A.  1025.        %  iii.  40.        §  Letters,  p.  13. 
II  i.  95.  t  ii.  263.  **  ii.  120. 


166  MASTEES   IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

draws.*  And  "  I  am  apt  to  think,"  Whichcote  adds, 
"that  in  the  heavenly  state  hereafter,  when  God  shall 
otherwise  declare  Himself  to  us  than  now  He  doth, 
those  latent  powers  which  now  we  have  may  open 
and  unfold  themselves,  and  thereby  we  may  be  made 
able  to  act  in  a  far  higher  way.  .  .  ."  t  The  nearer 
approach  to  God  will  give  us  more  use  of  ourselves. 
"  Oh  God,"  he  exclaims  elsewhere,  with  an  uncon- 
scious recollection  of  Augustine,  "  Thou  hast  made 
us  for  Thyself,  our  souls  are  unsatisfied  and  un- 
quiet in  us,  there  is  emptiness  till  Thou  dost  com- 
municate Thyself,  till  we  return  unto  Thee.  .  .  ."{ 
Self-denial,  self-surrender,  devotion  are  Thy  injunc- 
tions upon  us,  not  for  Thy  sake,  but  that  we  who 
are  empty,  shallow,  insufficient,  may  go  out  of 
ourselves,  and  find  in  Thee  fulness,  satisfaction, 
abundance. 

21.  It  was  a  necessary  consequence  of  Whichcote's 
conception  of  the  Gospel,  that  he  regarded  the  moral 
element  in  it  as  supreme.  In  spite  of  his  power  to 
deal  with  the  widest  thoughts,  he  constantly  checks 
himself  that  he  may  come  to  the  analysis  of  homely 
duties.  He  regards  the  positive  institutions  of  reli- 
gion as  absolutely  subservient  to  moral  ends.  Men 
may  not  multiply  them  as  binding.  §  "  There  iS  no 
Shekinah,"  he  says,  with  a  noble  figure,  "  but  by 


*  iii.  104.  t  iv.  196.  %  iv.  314. 

S  iv.  187.    A.  835. 


BENJAMIN   WHICHCOTE.  167 

Divine  assignation."  *  In  the  same  spirit  he  pleads, 
again  and  again,  against  subtleties  of  definition,  or 
the  imposition  upon  others  of  words  not  found  in  the 
Bible.f  "Where  the  doctrine,"  he  says,  "is  necessary 
and  important,  the  Scripture  is  clear  and  full :  "  we 
need  not  attempt  to  determine  things  more  particu- 
larly than  God  hath  determined  them.  J  "  Such  de- 
terminations," he  adds,  sadly,  "have  indeed  enlarged 
faith,  but  they  have  lessened  charity  and  multiplied 
divisions."  For  our  greatest  zeal  is  in  things  doubtful 
and  questionable.  §  We  are  more  concerned  for  that 
which  is  our  own  in  religion  than  for  that  which  is 
God's.  II  But  true  teachers  are  not  masters  but  helpers  ; 
they  are  not  to  make  religion,  but  to  show  it.lF  And 
while  men  are  what  they  are,  different  in  constitution 
and  circumstances,  there  must  be  differences  of 
opinion  ;  but  these,  Wliichcote  argues,  vanish  in  the 
light  of  common  allegiance  to  Christ,  and  contribute 
to  a  fuller  apprehension  of  the  truth.**  In  things 
rational  as  in  things  natural,  motion  is  required  to 
avert  the  corruption  of  unbroken  stillness. ft  The 
sun  having  broken  through  the  thickest  cloud,  wdll 
after  that  scatter  the  less  ;  nothing,  he  concludes,  is 
desperate  in  the  condition  of  good  men.  H 


*  A.  648.    iii.  200.                      ! 

1  i.  178. 

t  ii.  390.     A.  578.                      i 

**  iv.  204f;378f;3S0if. 

+  A.]  188;  lo2;  175.    ii.  241. 

712. 

§  A.  981  ;  103G  ;  1054. 

ft  i.  84. 

11  ii.  261 ;  A.  499. 

XX  ii.  20  ;  i.  65. 

168  MASTEES   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

22.  Even  this  splendid  hope  does  not  exhaust  the 
measure  of  Whichcote's  charity.  His  sympathy  ex- 
tends beyond  the  limits  of  that  one  Church  "  which 
grows  not  old."  Some  there  are,  he  says,  that 
are  mere  naturalists.  I  do  not  blame  them  as  the 
world  blames  them,  I  do  not  blame  them  that  they 
are  very  slow  of  faith,  that  they  will  not  believe 
farther  than  they  see  reason.  ...  A  man  cannot 
dishonour  God  and  abuse  himself  more  than  to  be 
light  of  faith.  Such  persons  one  w^ould  compassionate 
as  soon  as  any  men  in  the  world.  I  would  say  to 
them,  You  do  well  as  far  as  you  go ;  you  do  well  to 
entertain  all  that  God  hath  laid  the  foundation 
for ;  you  do  well  to  follow  the  light  of  reason ; 
but  do  you  think  that  God  can  do  no  more  ?  do 
you  think  that  God  did  all  at  once  ?  Nay,  rather, 
your  own  experience,  if  you  give  heed  to  it,  will 
in  due  time  reveal  to  you  the  wants  which  the 
Gospel  meets.* 

23.  Any  one  who  has  followed  this  outline  of 
Whichcote's  teaching,  which  I  have  given  as  far  as 
possible  in  his  own  words,  will,  I  think,  have  been 
struck  by  its  modern  type.  It  represents  much  that 
is  most  generous  and  noblest  in  the  "moral  divinity" 
of  to-day.  It  anticipates  language  which  we  hear  now 
on  many  sides.  It  affirms  in  the  name  of  Christianity 
much  that  is  said  to  be  in  antasfonism  with  it.      It 


313  f. 


BENJAMIN  WHICHCOTE.  1G9 

brings  faith  into  harmony  with  moral  law,  both  in  its 
object  and  in  its  issues.  It  affirms  the  final  identity 
of  the  true  conception  and  aims  of  philosophy,  re- 
ligion and  life. 

24.  The  fragmentariness  and  informality  of  the 
records  of  Whichcote's  teaching  obscure  in  some 
degree  its  scientific  value ;  but  it  is  not  difficult  to 
see  that  he  takes  account  of  the  manifold  elements 
which  enter  into  the  problems  of  morality  with  a 
breadth  of  view  which,  as  far  as  I  know,  is  found 
only  in  his  pupil  Smith,  till  it  appears  again,  though 
with  more  sombre  effects,  in  Bishop  Butler.  As 
compared  with  the  abstract,  intellectual  school  of 
Clarke,  he  insists  on  the  co-ordination  of  all  liuman 
faculties  and  endowments.  He  finds  the  expression 
of  humanity  in  action  and  not  in  thought.  He 
comes  before  God  in  the  fulness  of  his  complex 
nature.  In  the  picture  which  he  di-aws  of  man's 
moral  constitution  he  has  many  points  of  correspon- 
dence with  Shaftesbury,  who  *' searched  after  and 
published"  a  selection  of  his  Sermons  in  1698  ;*  but 
Whichcote  does  not,  like  Shaftesbury,  dissemble  the 
darker  aspects  of  life.  He  recognizes  harmony  as 
the  essential,  divine  law  of  the  universe,  but  he  never 
fails  to  recognize  that  it  has  been  disturbed.     His 


*  It  is  an  interesting  fact  that  Clarke  also  published  a  volume 
of  his  Sermons  iu  1707.    This  I  have  not  seen. 


170  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

hope,  as  far  as  he  expresses  it,  lies  in  the  efficacy  of 
the  discipline  of  God,  which,  he  seems  to  imply, 
must  sooner  or  later  secure  its  end. 

25.  In  spite  of  these  characteristics  of  his  line  of 
thought,  which  are  doubly  attractive  in  a  teacher 
singularly  pure  and  lofty,  Whichcote  failed  to  influ- 
ence English  speculation  permanently.  It  would  be 
interesting  to  discover  the  origin  of  Shaftesbury's 
admiration  for  him ;  for  his  power  seems  to  have 
been  practically  confined  to  those  with  whom  he 
came  into  personal  contact.  He  inspired  his  hearers, 
men  of  great  and  varied  power.  Smith  and  More, 
Worthington  and  Cudworth,  Patrick  and  Tillotson  ; 
but  he  founded  no  school,  and  left  no  successors  in  a 
third  generation. 

26.  The  transitoriness  of  Whichcote's  influence 
may  be  due  in  some  degree  to  political  causes; 
but  it  is  not  difficult  I  think,  to  indicate  defects 
in  his  teaching  which  contributed  to  this  partial 
failure.  He  bad  an  imperfect  conception  of  the  cor- 
porate character  of  the  Church,  and  of  the  Divine 
life  of  the  Christian  Society.  The  abstractions  of 
Plotinus  had  begun  to  produce  in  his  case  the  in- 
jurious effects  which  were  more  conspicuous  in  his 
follower.*^  He  had  little  or  no  sense  of  the  historic 
growth  of  the  Church.  His  teaching  on  the  Sacra- 
ments is  vague  and  infrequent. 

27.  But   these   defects   are   not  inherent  in  his 


BENJAMIN   AVHICHCOTE.  171 

principles.  On  the  contrary,  the  full  recognition  of 
the  Divine  office  of  history,  the  full  recognition  of  the 
Divine  gifts  of  the  Sacraments,  present  Christianity 
as  most  rational,  most  completely  answering  to  the 
reason  of  things,  to  the  whole  nature  of  humanity 
and  to  the  whole  nature  of  man.  Whichcote's 
principles  do  not  require  to  be  modified  at  the 
present  day,  but  to  be  applied  more  widely.  We 
can  easily  imagine  with  what  enthusiasm  he  would 
have  welcomed  now  "the  infinite  desire  of  know- 
ledge which  has  broken  forth  in  the  world,"  to 
use  the  phrase  of  Patrick ;  *  how  he  would  again 
have  warned  us  *'that  it  is  not  possible  to  free 
religion  from  scorn  and  contempt  if  her  priests  be 
not  as  well  skilled  in  nature  as  her  people,  and  her 
champions  furnished  with  as  good  artillery  as  her  ad- 
versaries ;"t  bow  he  would  have  reiterated  the  burden 
of  his  lesson  that  "  there  is  nothing  true  in  divinity 
which  is  false  in  philosophy,  or  the  contrary ; "  J  how 
he  would  have  called  us  back  from  our  tithings  of 
cumin  to  the  weightier  matters  of  the  law,  judgment, 
mercy,  and  faith ;  how  he  would  have  constrained  us 
with  loving  persuasiveness  to  take  account  of  the 
proportion  of  things  by  the  measure  of  life.  AVith 
larger  knowledge  and  on  an  ampler  field  we  are  then 
called  upon  to  exercise  his  faith,  to  claim  for  religion. 


*  Phenix,  ii.  p.  316.  f  Id.  p.  317.  J  Id.  I  c. 


172  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

in  the  name  of  the  Son  of  Man,  all  things  graceful, 
beautiful,  and  lovely ;  *  to  show  that  there  is  nothing 
in  it  but  what  is  sincere  and  solid,  consonant  to  reason 
and  issuing  in  freedom,  f  The  one  sure  evidence 
of  Christianity  is,  that  to  which  he  appealed,  the 
power  of  the  Christian  life.  If  the  Gospel  were 
a  soul  to  believers,  they  would  be  miraculous  in  the 
eyes  of  the  world,  and  bring  all  men  in  to  give  their 
testimony  for  religion.  J 

28.  One  remark  must  still  be  added  which  con- 
cerns us  in  our  crisis  of  transition  most  nearly. 
If  Whichcote  neglected  to  give  due  honour  to  the 
past,  he  had  that  rarer  and  more  elevating  faith  in  the 
present  which  is  the  support  of  generous  effort.  "  I 
give  much,"  he  writes,  in  answer  to  the  charge  of 
innovation ;  "  I  give  much  to  the  Spirit  of  God 
breathing  in  good  men  with  whom  I  converse  in  the 
present  world  .  .  .  and  think  that,  if  I  may  learn 
much  by  the  writings  of  good  men  in  former  ages.  .  . 
I  may  learn  more  by  the  actings  of  the  Divine  Spirit 
in  the  minds  of  good  men  now  alive ;  and  I  must  not 
shut  my  eyes  against  any  manifestations  of  God  in 
the  times  in  which  I  live.  The  times  wherein  I  live 
are  more  to  me  than  any  else  ;  the  works  of  God  in 
them  which  I  am  to  discern,  direct  in  me  both  prin- 
ciple, affection,  and  action ;  and  I  dare  not  blaspheme 


i.  59,  t  iii.  253.  X  iii-  ^5;  251. 


BENJAMIN  WHICHCOTE.  173 

free  aud  noble  spirits  in  religion  who  seek  after  truth 
with  indifference  and  ingenuity."  * 

In  that  confidence  lies  our  strength ;  in  those  act- 
ings, manifested  in  many  strange  ways  and  in  unex- 
pected quarters,  lies  our  guidance.  The  ages  of  faith 
are  not  yet  past.  The  last  word  of  God  has  not  yet 
been  spoken. 


Letters,  p.  115. 


JEREMY  TAYLOR,  D.D., 

BISHOP  OF  DOWN,  CONNOE,  AND  DROMORE. 
BoEN  1613:  Died  16G7.* 


1.    The   bearings  of  biography  on  criticism.      Few   writers  im- 
personal.— 2.  Jeremy  Taylor   and  his   college   contemporaries. 
John  Milton.— 3.   Cambridge   education  of  that   day.— 4.  His 
introduction  to  public  life.    Laud.   All  Souls.   Uppingham.    The 
Civil  War.    Eetirement  in  Wales.     Lisburn.     The  Kestoration. 
Bishop   of  Down  and   Connor.      Domestic  trials.      Death. — 5. 
Connection  of  his  fortunes  with  his  writings.     Leisure.     Contro- 
versial exigencies.      Influence  of  his  circumstances  upon   his 
style.     Martial  images.     Exquisite  beauty  and  variety  of  his 
references  to  external  nature.— 6.  ''  The  Shakespeare  of  English 
Prose."     Transcendent    merits    of   his    style.    Comparison    of 
Taylor  with  other  eminent  divines.     Surpassed  by  Milton  alone, 
and  that  only  in  a  few  passages. — 7.  Estimate  of  his  defects  and 
weaknesses  as  a  theologian  and  reasoner. — 8.  His  special  merits 
not  theological.    '  The  Ductor  Dubitantium.'   Decay  of  scholastic 
casuistry. — 9.  The  '  Liberty  of  Prophesying'  the  most  remarkable 
defence  of  Toleration  ever  written.     Taylor  defended  from  tlie 
charge  of  abandoning  his  principles. — 10.  He  is  greatest  in  his 
devotional  writings.    Incomparable  merits  of  his  sermons.    Their 
vast  superiority  to  those  of  the  present  day.      Causes  of  this. 
Their  immense  range  of  erudition.    Their  fertility  of  illustration. 
Their  unexampled  opulence  of  language.     Compared  with  other 
devotional  writings.     The  influence  they  have  exercised.     John 
Wesley.     The  present  age  not  likely  to  produce  such  a  writer  as 
Taylor.     The  treasures  which  he  has  bequeathed  to  us. 

1.  Theke  are  but  few  men  whose  works,  or  whose 
intellectual    position,    we   can   rightly   understand, 


*  The   references  to  Taylor's 
works  are   made    to    the   well- 


Taylor,'  as  well  as  of  the  little 
volume  of  the  late  Mr.  K.  A. 


known  edition  of  Bishop  Heber,  '  Willmott,    I    have    made    free 
of    whose     '  Life     of     Jeremy  ;  use. 


176      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY! 

unless  we  know  somettiing  of  tlie  circumstances  of 
their  lives.  One  or  two  indeed  of  the  world's 
greatest  seem,  like  Shakspeare,  to  rise  into  an  im- 
personal atmosphere,  either  from  the  keenness  of 
their  sympathies  or  the  intensity  of  their  imagina- 
tion ;  and  a  few  others  can  be  understood  apart  from 
their  biographies,  either  because  their  writings,  like 
those  of  Butler,  deal  with  the  abstractions  of  the 
pure  reason;  or  because,  as  in  the"Imitatio  Christi," 
all  earthly  passions  seem  to  die  away  in  that  clear 
air  of  eternity  wherein  they  live  and  move.  But  the 
lives  of  most  men  throw  a  marvellous  light  on  their 
writings,  and  there  are  some  whose  writings  cannot 
even  be  understood  at  all  without  some  knowledge 
of  their  career  and  of  their  times. 

2.  Let  us  then,  with  all  possible  brevity,  glance  at 
the  biography  of  Bishop  Jeremy  Taylor — the  most 
eloquent  certainly,  if 'not  the  greatest,  of  English 
preachers;  the  most  popular  of  English  devotional 
writers ;  and  perhaps  the  most  widely  influential,  if 
not  by  any  means  the  most  profound  or  accurate, 
of  English  divines. 

The  son  of  a  Cambridge  barber,  but  a  descendant 
of  the  holy  martyr,  Kowland  Taylor  of  Hadleigh, 
Jeremy  was  born  at  his  father's  house  in  the  year 
1613.  As  the  little  boy  stood  at  the  shop  door,  he 
may  often  have  noticed  the  stern  and  gloomy  linea- 
ments of  an  undergraduate  of  Sidney  Sussex  College, 
whose  name  was  Oliver  Cromwell,  and  may  have 


JEREMY   TAYLOR. 


admired  the  calmer,  and  more  untroubled  face  of  the 
Public  Orator  of  the  University,  who  was  afterwards 
«  Tlie  Country  Parson,"  George  Herbert.*  In  1626  he 
entered  Caius  College  as  a  sizar,  and  must  often  have 
seen — 

"  Familiarly,  and  in  his  scholar's  dress, 
Bounding  before  him,  yet  a  stripling  youth, 
A  boy,  no  better,  with  his  rosy  cheeks 
Angelical,  keen  eye,  courageous  look. 
And  conscious  step  of  puiity  and  pride," —  t 

one  whose  course  of  life  was  destined  to  be  utterly 
opposite  to  his  own ;  who  was  fiercely  to  attack  the 
episcopacy  of  which  he  was  the  able  defender,  and 
to  justify  the  execution  of  the  King  whose  devoted 
chaplain  he  became ;  who  was  to  be  elevated  by  the 
triumph  which  sent  Taylor  to  a  prison,  and  ruined 
by  the  Eestoration  which  raised  him  to  a  mitre ;  but 
who,  nevertheless,  was  united  to  him  by  the  immortal 
affinities  of  genius ;  who  shared  with  him  the  great 
combat  for  religious  and  intellectual  liberty ;  and  who 
stands  alone  with  him  in  supremacy  of  eloquence — 
the  immortal  poet  of  the  *'  Paradise  Lost."  I 


*  George  Herbert  was  ap- 
pointed Public  Orator  in  1619; 
Milton  entered  Christ's  College 
in  1625;  Henry  More,  John 
Pearson,  and  Ralph  Cudworth 
matriculated  in  1631. 

t  Wordsworth,  '  The  Prelude.' 

J  Milton  entered  at  Christ's 
College  in  1625.  Taylor  never 
mentioned  him,  nor  he  Taylor ; 
but  Milton  is  said  to  have  ad- 

[kixg's  coll.] 


mired   greatly   the    '  Liberty   of 
Prophesying,'  and  is  believed  to 
allude  to  him  in  the  lines  : 
"  Men  whose  life,  learning,  faith, 
and  pure  intent, 
Would  have  been  held  in  high 

esteem  with  Paul, 
Must  now  be  called  and  printed 

heretics 
By  shallow  Edwards  and  Scotch 
what-d'ye-call " — 

siuce  in  these  same  lines,  '  On 

N 


178 


MASTEKS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 


3.  It  takes  many  a  long  year  to  alter  the  habits 
and  traditions  of  education ;  and  though  the 
"  Novum  Organum "  had  now  been  written  for 
six  years,*  Cambridge  was  still  teaching  that  narrow 
and  effete  scholasticism  which  Milton,  with  his 
usual  impassioned  sincerity,  denounced  as  a  mass 
of  "ragged  notions  and  brabblements,"  and  "an 
asinine  feast  of  sow  thistles  and  brambles."t  But 
though,  for  all  practical  purposes  and  positive 
results,  such  culture  must  have  been  to  the  young 
intellect  of  that  day  a  pure  waste  of  time;  and 
though  we  trace  to  it  not  a  few  of  Taylor's  weak- 
nesses— his  tedious  fencing,  his  prolix  minuteness, 
his  subtle  and  formalising  casuistry — yet  the  stem 
and  patient  attention  wdiich.  it  demanded  was  no  doubt 
useful  to  him  as  a  system  of  mental  gymnastics.  It 
provided  him  with  what  a  modern  poet  has  called 
"  something  craggy  on  which  to  break  his  intellect,"! 


the  New  Forces  of  Conscience,' 
lie  expressly  names,  and  with 
supreme  contempt,  Samuel  Eu- 
therford,  who  in  1649  published, 
by  way  of  answer  to  Taylor,  his 
odious  attack  on  the  'Principle 
of  Toleration/ 

*  It  was  published  in  1620. 

t  As  regards  the  Schoolmen, 
Milton  shared  the  opinion  of 
Luther,  who  spoke  of  their  system 
and  writings  with  undisguised 
contempt.  In  his  'Defensio  Se- 
cunda,'  after  speaking  warmly 
of  the  humanistic  culture  of  his 


boyhood,  he  simply  says  of  Cam- 
bridge, "Illic  disciplinis  atque 
artibus  tradi  solitis  septennium 
studui."  Mr.  Willmott  refers  to 
Beaumont's  Psyche.  Some  re- 
marks on  the  Cambridge  studies 
of  that  day  may  be  found  in 
Ward's  'Life  of  Henry  More,* 
pp.  6-10;  Masson's  'Life  of  Mil- 
ton,' vol.  i.  See,  too,  Bacon's  in- 
structive remarks  on  tlieir  "  un- 
profitable subtlety  and  curiosity  " 
('  Advancement  of  Learning,' 
book  1.). 

X  Lord  Byron. 


JEREMY   TAYLOE.  179 

and  its  aridity  was  happily  relieved  and  supple- 
mented by  the  rich  enthusiastic  classical  culture 
which  had  been  introduced  by  the  Kenaissance. 
These  "  Literae  Humaniores  "  must  have  rescued  an 
imagination  which  might  well  have  starved  by 
doting  upon  what  Milton  calls  *' immeasurable,  in- 
numerable, and  therefore  unnecessary,  and  un- 
merciful volumes,"*  and  must  have  furnished  the 
mental  refreshment  which  enabled  him  to  turn  with- 
out despair  to  Occam  and  Estius,  Capreolas  and 
Suarez.t 

4.  Of  the  details,  however,  of  Taylor's  youth  and 
education,  nothing  is  known.  He  became  in  due 
time  a  Fellow  of  Caius  College,  and  then  came  for 
him  that  "  deep  nick  in  Time's  restless  wheel "  which 
determined  his  future.  Young  as  he  was,  he  was 
appointed  by  a  friend  to  preach  for  him  at  St. 
Paul's,  and  he  attracted  immediate  attention.  He 
was  throughout  life  singularly  handsome,  with  long 
curling  hair,  and  large  eyes  full  of  sweetness  and 
expression;  and  when  he  stood  before  his  great 
audience   the    glow    of    his    rich    and    marvellous 


*  Of  Keform  in  England,  i.       |  tensis,  Arias  Montanus,  Sanctes 

t  See  liis  letter  quoted  in  his  ;  Paguine,     Catharinus,     Flacius 

'  Life,'  by  Bishop  Heber,  p.  xc,  j  Illyricus,  Lauretus,  and  others, 

and    the    extraordinary   list    of :  without    so    much    as    naming 


authors  which  he  recommended 
to  clerical  students,  in  which  he 
mentions  Sixtus  Senensis,  Tena, 
Laurentius  e  Villa  Vincentio, 
Hyperius,    Martinus    Cantapra- 


Luther,  Melanchthon,  Calvin, 
Erasmus,  or  any  English  divine  ! 
(Second  Sermon  en  the  Minis- 
ter's Duty.    Works,  viii.  520.) 


N 


180      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

eloquence   was    enhanced    by    the    beauty   of    his 
appearance,  and  the — 

"  Gratior  et  pulcro  veniens  in  corpore  virtus." 

With  his  "  florid  and  youthful  beauty,  and  sweet 
and  pleasant  air,  he  seemed,"  says  his  friend  and 
successor,   Bishop   Eust,   "  like   some  young  angel 
newly  descended  from  the  visions  of  glory."     It  was 
not  long  before  the  fame  of  the  youthful  preacher 
reached   the   ears   of   Archbishop   Laud.     Narrow, 
superstitious,  intolerant,  obstinate.  Laud  had  yet  the 
high  merit  of  appreciating  the  promise  of  genius ; 
and  "  thinking  it  more  for  the  advantage   of  the 
world   that  such  mighty  parts   should  be  afforded 
better  opportunities  of  study  and  improvement  than 
a  course  of  constant  preaching  would  allow  of,"  he 
wisely  and  kindly  saved  the  young  orator  from  the 
ruinous  snares  of  a  premature  popularity.  He  accord- 
ingly made  Jeremy  Taylor  a  Fellow  of  All  Souls, 
and  subsequently  nominated  him  his  chaplain,  and, 
in  the  year  1637,  induced  Bishop  Juxon  to  collate 
him   to    the    rectory   of    Uppingham.      There    he 
married,  and  the  five  years  at  Uppingham  were  pro- 
bably among  the  '^happiest  of  his  life.     But  while  he 
was  living  in  this  quiet  home,  the  storm  of  civil  war 
burst  over  the  unhappy  kingdom.     In  1640  Laud 
was  sent  to  the  Tower,  and  in   1642  Taylor  pub- 
lished, oy  the  King's  command,  his  first  work,  the 
'  Episcopacy  Asserted.'     Then  began  years  of  trial 


JEREMY   TAYLOR. 


181 


and  wan^lering.  His  home  was  pillaged,  his  family 
driven  out  of  doors.  Joining  the  King,  who  had 
made  him  his  chaplain,  he  lived  an  unsettled  life, 
following  the  army  from  place  to  place.  At  the 
siege  of  Cardigan  Castle  he  was  taken  prisoner,  and 
when  released  supported  himself  for  a  time  by 
keeping  a  school  at  Llanvihangel  Aberbythic.  "  In 
the  great  storm,"  he  says,  "  which  dashed  the  vessel 
of  the  Church  all  in  pieces,  I  was  cast  on  the 
coast  of  Wales,  and  in  a  little  boat  tliought  to  have 
enjoyed  that  rest  and  quietness  which  in  England  I 
could  not  hope  for."*  It  was  during  this  period 
that  he  married  his  second  wife,  and  lived  in  the 
lovely  neighbourhood  of  Golden  Grove.  His  seclu- 
sion was  protected  by  the  noble  patronage  of  Lord 
and  Lady  Carbery,t  and  cheered  by  the  active 
friendship  of  the  kind-hearted  Evelyn.  To  this 
retirement  was  due  the  leisure  which  enabled  him, 
in  spite  of  want  and  poverty,  to  publish  some  of  his 
greatest  works :  '  The  Liberty  of  Prophesying,' 
'The  Life  of  Christ,'  the  'Sermons,'  the  'Treatise 
on   the   Keal  Presence,'  and   the    '  Golden   Grove.' 


*  Dedication  to  '  Liberty  of 
Prophesying.' 

t  The  scenery  of  the  neigh- 
bourhood is  described  in  Dyer's 
btautiful  but  now  almost  forgot- 
ten poem  of  '  Grongar  Hill.'  It 
was  the  singular  good  fortune  of 
Lord   Carbery  to  be   connected 


with  three  very  eminent  poets. 
Jeremy  Taylor  was  his  friend 
and  guest ;  his  second  wife,  the 
Lady  Alice  Egerton,  was  the 
heroine  of  Milton's  'Comus;' 
and  Butler,  the  author  of  '  Hudi- 
bras,'  was  afterwards  his  private 
secretary. 


182  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

In  1658,  after  various  trials  and  adversities,  of  which 
we  have  only  an  obscure  outline,  he  accepted  a  very 
poor  Lectureship  at  Lisburn  in  Ireland,  which  was, 
however,  rendered  more  tolerable  by  the  friendship 
of  Lord  Conway,  and  the  exquisite  scenery  of 
Louofh  Neaofh,  where  an  islet  is  still  shown  to  which 
he  would  often  retire  to  pray  and  meditate.  At  the 
Kestoration,  Taylor,  if  any  man,  had  a  permanent 
claim  to  be  rewarded  by  the  Eoyal  Family,  whom,  to 
the  utter  ruin  of  his  own  fortunes,  he  had  so  faith- 
fully served ;  and  whose  fall  had  been  consoled  and 
irradiated  by  the  splendour  of  his  genius  and  elo- 
quence. Bat  while  smaller  and  less  worthy  men 
were  elevated  to  the  vacant  English  sees,  Charles 
was  content  to  relegate  Taylor  to  the  Bishopric  of 
Down  and  Connor,  to  which  was  afterwards  added, 
on  account  of  his  "  virtue,  wisdom,  and  industry," 
the  see  of  Dromore.  His  declining  years  were  thus 
doomed  to  exile  among  people  to  whom  his  style 
of  eloquence  was  little  suited,  and  to  a  sphere  of 
labour  where  his  peace  was  disturbed  by  the  furious 
obloquy  alike  of  Eoman  Catholics  and  Dissenters.* 


*  Taylor,  though  his  disposi- 
tion was  eminently  sunny  and 
contented  (see  the  exquisitely 
beautiful  passage  in  '  Holy  Liv- 
ing,' ii.  §  6),  yet  felt  ill  at  ease 
and  out  of  health  in  Ireland,  aud 


letter  to  Archbishop  Sheldon, 
1664  ('Life,'  p.  cxix.),  he  says  of 
his  bishopric ;  "  I  find  myself 
thrown  into  a  place  of  torment ;" 
and  he  calls  his  position  "  an  in- 
supportable burden."     Letter  to 


more  than  once  expressed  a  wish  |  Ormonde,  1660  (ib.  ci.),  in  which 
to  be  removed  to  England.    In  a  |  he  also  says :  "  It  were  better 


JEREMY   TAYLOE. 


183 


His  last  days  were  darkened,  too,  by  domestic  trials. 
His  tender  heart  had  been  already  torn  by  the  loss 
of  several  sweet  children  who  died  in  early  years  ;* 
but  now  lie  was  destined  to  lose  two  sons  in  the 
prime  of  youth,  and  both  in  ways  that  rendered 
their  deaths  unspeakably  shocking.  The  elder  fell 
in  a  duel ;  the  younger  died  from  the  effects  of 
excesses  which  he  had  learnt  in  the  dissolute  com- 
pany of  Villiers,  Duke  of  Buckingham.  Very 
shortly  afterwards,  in  the  fifty-fifth  year  of  his  age, 
and  the  seventh  of  his  episcopate,  a  fever  seized 
him  which,  after  ten  days,  "  untied  the  soul  from  its 
chain,  and  let  it  go  forth,  first  into  liberty  and  then 
to  glory. "t  So,  prematurely,  as  he  had  himself  pro- 
gnosticated,! ended  the  life  of  a  man  of  rare  good- 


for  me  to  be  a  poor  curate  in  a 
village  chnrcli  than  bishop  over 
sucli  intolerable  persons." 

*  Letter  to  Evelyn,  July  19. 
1656 :  "  Deare  Sir,  I  am  iu  some 
little  disorder  by  reason  of  the 
death  of  a  little  child  of  mine,  a 
boy  that  lately  made  us  very 
glad ;  but  now  he  rejoices  in  his 
little  orbe,  while  we  think  and 
si^h  and  long  to  be  as  safe  as  he 
is"  ('Life,'  i.  liii.).  Feb.  22, 
16of:  "It  has  pleased  God  to 
send  the  small  pose  and  feavers 
among  my  children  ;  and  I  have 
since  I  received  your  last  buried 
two  sweet  hopeful  boyes"  (ib. 
1x1,).  "No  man  can  tell,  but 
he  that  loves  his  children,  how 


many  delicious  accents  make  a 
man's  heart  dance  in  the  pretty 
conversation  of  those  dear 
pledges ;  their  childishness,  their 
stammering,  their  little  angers, 
their  innocence,  their  imperfec- 
tions, their  necessities,  are  so 
many  little  emanations  of  joy 
and  comfort  to  him  that  delights 
in  their  person  and  society  ;  but 
he  that  loves  not  his  wife  and 
children  feeds  a  lioness  at  home, 
and  broods  a  nest  of  sorrows." — 
'  The  Marriage  Ring.' 

t  'Holy  Dying,'  ii.  4. 

t  See  letter  to  Sheldon,  writ- 
ten in  the  fourth  year  of  his 
episcopate  :  "  I  humbly  desiie 
that  your  Grace  will  not  wholly 


184 


MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 


ness  and  sweetness,  who  owed  in  no  small  degree 
to  his  own  virtues  his  want  of  brilliant  success  in 
earthly  fortunes  ;  and  who,  if  we  cannot  assign  to  him 
as  the  flattering  poet  assigned  to  Bishop  Berkeley, 
''every  virtue  under  heaven,"  was  yet  eminently 
noble  and  unselfish,  and  presented  no  less  than 
Berkeley  did,  "the  happiest  possible  synthesis  of 
the  Divine,  the  scholar,  and  the  gentleman." 

5.  Even  so  cursory  a  glance  as  this  may  serve,  I 
hope,  to  illustrate  how  entirely  it  is  the  hand  of  God 
that  weaves  the  pattern  which  He  requires  in  the 
web  of  noble  lives ;  and  that  even  by  those  dispensa- 
tions which  seem  most  afflictive  He  is  preparing  us, 
so  that  we  best  may  do  His  work,  which  is  and  ought 
to  be  our  own.  Throughout  every  change  in  Taylor's 
career  we  can  trace  the  way  in  which  the  Providence 
that  ordained  his  fortunes  added  essentially,  at  every 
step,  to  his  usefulness  and  his  greatness.  The  strokes 
which  seemed  most  pitilessly  to  gash  the  quivering 
reed  were  but  shaping  it  into  the  potency  of  divinest 
music.  It  was  not  only  that  his  character  gained 
strength,  and  his  words  grace  and  variety,  from  his 
misfortunes,  but  one  after  another  his  works  sprang 
mainly  from  the  exigencies  of  his  position.      *  The 


lay  me  aside,  and  cast  off  all 

thoughts  of  removing  me 

For  the  case  is  so  that  the  coun- 
try does  not  agree  with  my  health 
....  and  if  your  Grace  be  not 


willing  I  should  die  immaturely, 
I  shall  still  hope  you  will  bring 
me  to  or  near  yourself  once 
more  *'  ('  Life,'  p.  cxix.). 


JEREMY  TAYLOR.  185 

Defence  of  Episcopacy/  *  The  Liberty  of  Pro- 
phesying,' the  *  Sermons/  *  The  Dissuasive  from 
Popery/  *  The  Ductor  Dubitantium/  were  all 
evoked  by  the  turbulent  conditions  which  darkened 
the  peace  of  his  days ;  so  that  from  his  temporary 
afflictions  the  Church  has  won  a  permanent  inherit- 
ance of  thought  and  learning.  In  gentler  and  softer 
times  Taylor  might  have  been  reduced  to  the  posi- 
tion of  a  mere  popular  preacher,  constantly  called 
upon  to  utilise  the  crude  thoughts,  and  perpetuate 
the  fleeting  impressions  of  his  mind,  and  condemned 
to  that  superficial  mediocrity  of  erudition  which  is 
inevitable  to  one  whose  plain  duties  rob  him  of  all 
leisure  for  deep  study.  Had  it  not  been  for  the 
undisturbed  peace  and  compulsory  retirement  of 
Golden  Grove  and  Portmore,  he  might  have  lacked 
the  opportunities  which  alone  rendered  possible  his 
greatest  intellectual  efforts.  Even  his  immortal 
Sermons  gained,  from  his  varied  surroundings,  no 
little  of  that  rich  imagery  which  embroiders  their 
clotli  of  gold.  Thus,  to  his  terrible  experiences  of 
the  battle  field  *  we  owe,  among  many  others,  the 
image  of  the  bold  trooper,  fighting  in  the  confusion 
of  a  battle,  and  being  worn  with  heat  and  rage, 
receiving  from  the  sword  of  his  enemy  wounds  open 
like  the  grave,  but  he  felt  them  not  ;t  and  of  the 


*  This  was  first  noticed  by  j      f  '  Apples  of  Sodom,'  Works, 
Mr.  Willmott  ('  Jeremy  Taylor,'    v.  293. 
p.  lii.).  1 


186      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

poor  soldier  in  a  trench,  standing  in  his  arms  and 
wounds,  pale  and  faint,  weary  and  watchful,  and  at 
night  having  a  bullet  pulled  out  of  his  flesh,  and 
shivers  from  his  bones,  and  enduring  his  mouth 
to  be  sewn  up  from  a  horrible  rent  to  his  own 
dimensions.*  And  it  is  to  the  umbrageous  woods 
and  gardens  which  girdled  the  mansion  of  Lord 
Carbery  that  we  owe  the  pictures  of  the  "  faint 
echoes  from  distant  valleys ;"  "  the  fountain  swell- 
ing over  the  green  turf;"  "the  gentle  wind  shaking 
the  leaves  into  a  refreshment  and  cooling  shade ;" 
"  the  little  bee,  feeding  on  dew  or  manna,  and 
living  upon  what  falls  every  morning  from  the 
storehouse  of  heaven,  clouds,  and  Providence ;" 
**  the  rainbow,  half  made  of  the  glory  of  light,  and 
half  of  the  moisture  of  a  cloud ;"  "  the  breath  of 
heaven,  not  willing  to  disturb  the  softest  stalk  of 
a  violet;"  "the  boisterous  north  wind,  passing 
through  the  yielding  air,  but  when  it  hath  been 
checked  with  the  united  strength  of  a  wood,  grow- 
ing mighty,  and  dwelling  there,  and  forcing  the 
highest  branches  to  stoop  and  make  a  path  for  it, 
on  the  summit  of  all  its  glories."  Taylor  was  one  of 
those  few  immortal  spirits  in  whom  a  massive  erudi- 
tion has  not  crushed  an  exquisite  feeling  for  the 
sights  and  sounds  of  nature.     What  can  be  happier 


*  'Holy  Dying,'  iii.  4.     This  terribly  vivid  illustration  is  ol) 
viously  due  to  personal  experience. 


JEKEMY  TAYLOE.  187 

than  his  description  of  "the  sun  approaching  to- 
wards the  gates  of  the  morning,  first  opening  a  little 
eye  of  heaven,  and  sending  away  the  spirits  of  dark- 
ness, and  giving  light  to  a  cock,  and  calling  up  the 
lark  to  matins,  and  by  and  by  gilding  the  fringes  of 
a  cloud,  peeping  over  the  Eastern  liills,  thrusting 
out  his  golden  horns  like  those  which  decked  the 
brows  of  Moses,  when  he  was  forced  to  wear  a  veil, 
because  himself  had  seen  the  face  of  God  "?  What 
wealth  of  fancy ;  what  poetry  of  expression !  After 
reading  such  a  passage  as  this,  who  will  dispute  his 
pre-eminence  of  supremacy  in  the  mastery  of  the 
English  tongue  ?  Take  two  of  his  best  known  and 
loveliest  passages :  "  For  so  have  I  seen  a  lark 
rising  from  his  bed  of  grass,  and  soaring  upwards, 
singing  as  he  rises,  and  hopes  to  get  to  heaven,  and 
climbs  above  the  clouds ;  but  the  poor  bird  was 
beaten  back  by  the  loud  sighings  of  an  eastern 
wind,  and  his  motion  made  irregular  and  inconstant, 
descending  more  at  every  breath  of  the  tempest 
than  it  could  recover  by  the  libration  and  frequent 
weighing  of  its  wings,  till  the  little  creature  sat 
down  to  pant  and  stay  till  the  storm  was  over ;  and 
then  it  made  a  prosperous  flight,  and  did  rise  and 
sing  as  if  it  had  learnt  music  from  an  angel,  as  he 
passed  sometimes  through  the  air  about  his  minister- 
ing here  below ; — so  is  the  prayer  of  a  good  man."  * 


Second  Sermon  on  the  "  Eeturn  of  Prayers." 


188      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

Did  English  prose  ever  combine  a  more  playful 
grace  with  a  more  lyric  tenderness  ?  And  Avhen 
speaking  of  the  change  wrought  by  death,  he  says : 
"  So  have  I  seen  a  rose  newly  springing  from  the 
clefts  of  its  hood,  and  at  first  it  was  fair  as  the 
morning,  and  full  with  the  dew  of  heaven  as  a 
lamb's  fleece ;  but,  when  a  ruder  breath  had  forced 
open  its  virgin  modesty,  and  dismantled  its  too 
youthful,  and  unripe  retirements,  it  began  to  put  on 
darkness,  and  decline  to  softness  and  the  symptoms 
of  a  sickly  age ;  it  bowed  the  head  and  broke  its 
stalk,  and  at  night  having  lost  some  of  its  leaves, 
and  all  its  beauty,  it  fell  into  the  portion  of  weeds 
and  outworn  faces."*  What  solemn  music,  what 
delicate  painting,  what  unrivalled  aptitude  of  ex- 
pression !  Has  there  been  any  preacher  before  or 
since  who  could  equal  these  incidental  metaphors  ? 
Is  there  any  living  preacher  who  could  write  three 
lines  w  hich  could  compare  to  any  one  of  them  ?  Yet 
these  were  mainly  due  to  that  delicious  country  life 
in  which  ambition  seemed  over,  and  since  the  poet 
preacher's  days  were  being  spent  face  to  face  with 
Eternity,  in  homes  where  he  could  see  the  flowers 
blow,  and  the  dew  fall,  his  soul,  undevastated  by 
meaner  cares,  could  "climb  by  these  sunbeams  to 
tlie  Father  of  Lights." 

G.  And  these  passages  are  alone  sufficient  to  show 


Holy  Dying,'  i,  §  2. 


JEEEMY   TAYLOR.  189 

why  an  English  poet*  has  rightly  called  Jeremy 
Taylor  "the  Shakspeare  of  English  prose."  No 
lano'uao:e  can  be  too  warm  for  that  wealth  and 
beauty  of  style  which  constitutes  perhaps  his  chief 
claim  to  our  admiration,  and.  which  a  living  writer 
has  compared  to  "  a  deeply  murmuring  sea  with  the 
sunlight  on  it."t  It  transcends  criticism.  It  is 
indeed  easy  to  point  out  the  multitudinousness  and 
confusion  of  images ;  the  occasional  introduction  of 
mean  expressions  ;J  the  interchange  with  the  beauti- 
ful of  what  is  loathly  and  grotesque :  §  but,  not  to 
say  that  this  is  sometimes  but  the  perfect  skill  of 
the  musician  "  falling  from  concord  or  sweet  accord 
to  discord  or  harsh  accord,"  ||  the  total  effect  is  simply 
inimitable,  and  we  feel  that  we  are  in  contact  with 
a  mind  that  creates  the  laws  of  its  own  expres- 
sion, and  beautifies  even  what  is  irregular  and  in 
itself  objectionable,  by  stamping  it  with  the  sovran 
impress  of  its  own  individuality.  It  is  quite  easy  to 
understand  the  havoc  which  ignorant,  vulgar,  and 
conceited    critics,    who   profess    to    lay   down   the 


*  Mason,  in  a  letter  to  Gray, 
t  Leeky,  'History  of  Tolera- 
tion.' 

X  It  should,  however,  be  no- 
ticed that  an  expression  may 
sound  mean  now  which  was  not 
always  so.  "Willmott  ('  Jeremy 
Taylor,'  p.  233)  censures :  "  We 
shall  dishonour  the  sufferings  of 
our  blessed  Saviour  if  we  think 


them  to  be  an  umbrella  to  shelter 
impious  and  ungodly  living " 
('  The  Invalidity  of  a  Deathbed 
Eepentance,"  pt.ii.  ad  Jin.).  But 
the  word  would  not  convey  to 
Taylor  so  vulgar  a  notion  as  to 
us. 

§  See  some  remarks  in  Taine's 
'  English  Literature,'  i.  384. 

II  Bacon. 


190  MASTERS  IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

universal  laws  of  literature,  would  make  of  such 
reckless  autocrats  of  language  as  Taylor  and  Shak- 
speare ;  and  yet  their  very  faults  become  almost 
admirable  because  they  are  characteristic  of  them- 
selves. It  is  quite  true  that  Jeremy  Taylor  has  not 
the  rude  force  of  Latimer,  the  immense  erudition  of 
Ussher,  the  balanced  stateliness  and  perfect  equi- 
librium of  Hooker,  the  flashing  wit  of  South,  the 
occasional  intensity  of  Donne,  the  careful  accuracy 
of  Pearson,  the  compressed  forcefulness  of  Barrow, 
the  metaphysical  profundity  of  Butler,  the  tender 
unction  of  Wilson,  the  polished  equanimity  of 
Tillotson, — and,  after  these,  but  few  others  are  at  all 
worth  mentioning;  but,  as  in  unfeigned  piety  and 
blameless  purity  of  life  he  stands  their  equal,  so  in 
the  combination  of  genius  with  eloquence  he  towers 
above  the  greatest  of  them  all.  In  the  fine  expres- 
sion of  Bishop  Warburton  he  darts  into  all  their 
excellences  a  ray  of  lightning.  And  again,  if  he 
has  not  the  characteristic  merit  of  each  of  these, 
he  is  equally  free  from  their  characteristic  defects ; 
he  has  none  of  Latimer's  indecorum,  or  of  South's 
vulgarity,  or  Donne's  tediousness,  or  Butler's 
aridity,  or  Tillotson's  coldness,  or  Wilson's  common- 
place. In  English  prose  he  has  but  one  rival  in 
John  Milton.  But  though  not  even  Taylor  can 
equal  the  prose  of  Milton,  when  he  "  has  his  garland 
and  singing  robes  about  him,"  yet  it  is  only  now  and 
then,  at  impassioned  moments,  that  the  poet  puts 


JEREMY  TAYLOR.  191 

on  the  glory  which  is  the  preacher's  daily  wear ;  and 
it  was  by  no  means  the  least  acute,  or  qualified  of 
English  critics,  who  said  of  Jeremy  Taylor,  "  The 
most  eloquent  of  divines,  I  had  almost  said  of  men; 
and  if  I  had,  Demosthenes  would  nod  approval  and 
Cicero  express  assent."* 

7.  I  have  dwelt  thus  at  length  on  the  great 
Bishop's  style,  because  it  is  his  style  which  differen- 
tiates him  from  all  who  have  preceded  or  followed 
him  ;  but  as  it  is  the  object  of  these  Lectures  to 
sketch  the  place  in  English  literature  and  theology 
of  the  great  men  with  whom  they  are  occupied, 
and  not,  by  any  means,  to  deal  in  indiscriminate 
eulogy,  I  will  now  acknowledge  frankly,  but  with 
due  respect  and  submission,  the  defects  and  weak- 
ness of  this  eminent  prelate,  whom  it  is  impossible 
to  read  without  learning  also  to  honour  and  to  love. 

I  will  say  then  at  once,  that  it  is  not  as  a  theo- 
logian, in  the  more  narrow  and  technical  sense  of 
the  word,  that  Taylor  is  greatest.  Some  may  set 
this  down  to  the  account  of  his  wisdom  ;  and  fre- 
quently as  he  wrote  on  dogma,  yet  the  absence  of 
precision  is  in  accordance  with  his  own  express 
views.t  On  any  question  of  rigid  dogmatic  theology 
his  name  would  carry  less  weight  than  those  of 
Jew^ell,  Hooker,  Sanderson,  Andrewes,  Bull,  or  Water- 


*  Coleridge.  I  sophy  of  justification,  and  what 

t  "No  man  should  fool  him-  {  causality  faith  hath  in  it,"  &c. 
self  by  disputing  about  the  philo-  |  ('  Works,'  i.  ccsxviii.)- 


192 


MASTERS  I^[  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY! 


land.  The  rigid  scrupulosity  of  precisely  accurate 
reasoning  and  definition,  for  which  we  look  to  a 
theologian  proper,  is  hardly  consistent  with  the 
passion  of  the  poetic  orator,  and  the  zeal  of  the 
voluminous  controversialist.  That  Taylor  is  some- 
times guilty  of  inconsistencies  cannot  be  denied ;  * 
nor  that  his  conclusions  are  often  superior  to  the 
reasoning  by  which  he  supports  them  ;t  nor  that  he 
occasionally  resorts  to  arguments  of  which  he  else- 
where exposes  the  weakness  ;|  nor  that  he  sometimes 
relies  on  a  mere  illustration  as  though  it  had  all  the 
cogency  of  a  proof ;  §  nor  that  he  sometimes  "  over- 
looks the  intrusion  of  ragged  lacqueys  among  his 
grand  procession  of  magnates  in  all  their  splendid 
paraphernalia ; "  ||  nor  that  he,  now  and  then,  seems  to 
indulge  in  a  subtlety  which  might  almost  be  termed 


*  Compare  his  remarks  on 
Baptism,  in  '  Liberty  of  Pro- 
phesying,' and  in  his  '  Discourse 
of  Confirmation;'  'Works,'  v. 
90,  438,  et  passim. 

t  See,  for  instance,  the  un- 
tenable arguments  by  which  he 
tries  to  prove  the  Divine  origin 
of  Confu-mation. 

X  See  his  treatise  on  Episco- 
pacy, §  4S,  where  he  draws  a 
distinction  between  things  which 
Bishops  may  not  do  as  Bishops, 
and  may  do  as  secular  princes — 
a  disintegration  of  individuality 
which  he  elsewhere  utterly  re- 


jects. This  is  less  surprising 
because  it  is  one  of  the  defects 
of  the  'DuctorDubitantium'  that, 
misled  by  Romish  casuists,  he 
admits  the  use  in  controversy  of 
arguments  known  to  be  weak, 
to  an  extent  which  Binton,  for 
instance,  would  have  scorned. 
('  Works,'  ix.  93,  seq. ;  Coleridge's 
'  Notes  on  English  Divines,'  p, 
175 ;  Hallam's  '  Literature  of 
Europe,'  iii.  268. 

§  See  '  Apology  for  Liturgies,' 
Pref.  §  6. 

11  See  Coleridge's  '  Notes  on 
English  Divines,'  i.  195. 


JEREMY   TxVYLOE. 


193 


Jesuitical;*  nor  that  he  is  in  some  instances  un- 
critical in  the  use  of  authorities,!  and  eminently 
credulous  in  the  admission  of  facts  and  anecdotes ;  i 
nor  that,  with  all  the  just  estimate  wliich  Daille 
had  taught  him  of  the  contradictions  and  defects 
of  tlie  Fathers,  he  yet  often  allows  himself  to  be 
unduly  overshadowed  by  their  mere  assertions  ;§  nor 
that  he  is  sometimes  misled  by  the  impetuosity  of 


*  Instances  will  be  found  in 
his  controversial  works  passim. 

t  See  Heber's  '  Life,'  p.  cxxvii. 

X  See  '  Works,'  ii.  18 ;  iii.  241 ; 
V.  292,  &c, 

§  But,  as  in  so  many  instances, 
his  language  on  the  untrust- 
worthiness  of  the  actual  text  of 
the  Fathers  is  unguarded  and 
exaggerated  ('Liberty  of  Pro- 
phesying,' §  viii.  4  ;  '  Works,'  v. 
489,.  Readily  as  he  sets  tliem 
aside  as  authorities  in  matters  of 
controversy,  he  yet  elsewhere 
quotes  their  barest  assertions 
with  absolute  credulity,  and  does 
not  seem  to  see  that  the  giants 
of  the  Reformation  were,  if  "  not 
inferior  to  St.  Augustine,"  as 
Coleridge  says,  yet  sm*ely  "  worth 
a  brigade  of  the  Cyprians,  Fir- 
milians,  and  the  like."  And 
yet  Taylor  quotes  Cyprian  quite 
incessantly,  and  Luther,  I  be- 
lieve, not  once.  Certainly  his 
arguments  against  the  autho- 
rity of  the  Fathers  are  hardly 
consistent    with    his    professed 

[king's  coll.] 


desire  that  "  their  great  reputa- 
tion should  be  preserved  as  sacred 
as  it  ought."  How  different  is 
this  from  tlie  daring  remarks  of 
Milton  on  the  same  subject  : 
"Redeo  ad  patrum  commenta- 
tiones,  de  quibus  hoc  summatim 
accipe.  Quicquid  illi  dixerint, 
neque  ex  libris  saciis,  aut  ratione 
aliqua  satis  idonea  confirmave- 
runt,  perinde  mild  erit  ac  si  qiiis 
alius  e  vidgo  dizisset"'  (' Def.' 
cap.  4  ;  Of  '  True  Religion,'  ad 
init. ;  '  Of  Reform  in  England,' 
passim).  It  is  in  this  manly 
and  dauntless  forthrightness  that 
Milton  towers  so  high  above 
Taylor.  But  Hallam  has  acutely 
pointed  out  that  Taylor's  literary 
method  was  not  to  soften  any- 
thing which  he  had  once  said, 
but  to  remove  offence  by  "in- 
serting something  else  of  an 
opposite  colour"  (' Literature  of 
Euroi)e,'  ii.  848).  This  unfor- 
tunate method  naturally  detracts 
from  the  weight  of  his  isolated 
sentiments. 

0 


194 


MASTEKS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY 


polemic  into  confessedly  untenable  positions ;  *  nor 
that  for  these  reasons  there  are  vulnerable  joints  in 
the  golden  panoply  of  his  eloquence  ;  nor  that  he  is 
far  from  successful  in  dealing  with  subtle  meta- 
physical distinctions  ;  nor  .that  he  sometimes  played 
about  the  surface  of  a  subject  without  going  to  the 
very  heart  of  it ;  nor  that  his  grasp  of  fundamental 
principles  is  often  defective;!  nor  even,  which  is 
the  most  serious  blot  of  all,  that  it  is  difficult  to 
acquit  some  of  his  views  of  technical  heresy — diffi- 
cult at  any  rate  to  acquit  parts  of  his  "  Unum  Ne- 
cessarium  "  and  ''  Letter  on  Original  Sin,"  of  Pela- 
gianism,  or  to  reconcile  them  with  the  undoubted 
doctrines  of  the  Christian  Church.  Some  of  these 
defects  are  due  to  the  fact  that  he,  like  other  great 
thinkers,  was  entangled  in  the  very  spirit  of  system 


*  See  his  '  Treatise  of  Epi- 
scopacy,' in  whicli  the  facts  upon 
"which  he  buihis  are  historically 
untenable,  and  the  importance 
which  he  attaches  to  the  office  is 
exaggerated  (see '  Life,'  clxxxiii). 
In  both  respects  he  contrasts  un- 
favourably with  Hooker  in  his 
dealings  with  the  same  subject 
(Eccl.  Pol.  iii.  8). 

t  Taylor's  views  of  original 
sin  and  of  the  unfruitfulness  of 
deathbed  repentance  are  among 
his  least  satisfactory  contribu- 
tions to  theology.  The  former 
are  due  to  a  violent  reaction 
against  Calvinism,  but  he  did 


not  seem  to  see  that  his  own 
scheme  did  but  shift  the  diffi- 
culty, without  in  the  smallest 
degree  removing  it.  See  the 
admirable  criticism  of  his  views 
in  Coleridge's  '  Aids  to  Eeflec- 
tion.'  The  notion  of  Adam's 
original  paradisiacal  perfection 
is  a  Eabbinic  fiction,  which  he 
shared  with  South  and  many 
other  eminent  divines,  and  which 
survives  to  our  own  day  in  some 
writers.  Even  Heber  pronounces 
his  doctrine  of  original  sin  to  be 
"neither  good  logic  nor  good 
divinity." 


JEREMY   TAYLOR.  195 

of  which  he  saw  the  peril ;  and  that  .driven  into  the 
necessities  of  conflict  on  minute  and  mysterious 
distinctions  of  dogma,  he  became  in  some  degree 
illogical  by  trying  to  map  out,  in  the  forms  of  the 
Understanding,  truths  that  can  only  be  appre- 
hended by  the  Reason ;  and  sometimes  verbally, 
though  not  essentially  heretical  by  attempting  "to 
soar  into  the  secrets  of  the  Deity  on  the  waxen 
wings  of  the  senses."*  He  might  have  been  more 
accurate  as  a  theologian  if  he  had  been  less 
supremely  gifted  as  a  poet  and  as  an  orator,  and  less 
keenly  sympathetic  and  appreciative  as  a  man.  "  In 
fact  he  would  have  been  too  great  for  man,"  says 
Coleridge,  "  if  he  had  not  occasionally  fallen  below 
himself."  And  indeed  many  of  these  weaknesses 
were  the  inseparable  concomitants  of  some  of  his 
best  sources  of  strength — the  prodigious  agility  of 
his  intellect,  the  vivid  power  of  his  imagination,  the 
exceeding  keenness  of  his  sensibility,  the  boundless 
wealth  of  his  erudition,  the  multifarious  variety  of 
his  reading — above  all,  that  oceanic  tide  of  his  lan- 


*  Bacon.  It  would  be  quite  also  bear  in  mind  the  date  of  the 
easy  to  quote  isolated  sentences  j  work  from  which  we  quote.  It 
of  apparently  the  most  opposite  j  was  inevitable  that  a  mind  so 
tendency  from  his  remarks  on  the  j  susceptible  as   Taylor's    should 


Two  Sacraments.  We  must,  in 
fact,  in  quoting  his  authority, 
consider  always  whether  he  is 
speaking  as  a  controversialist,  or 
as  a  rhetorician,  or  as  a  careful 
and  orthodox  divine.     We  must 


be  modified  by  its  surroundings, 
and  to  this  is  due  the  increased 
tendency  to  give  prominence  to 
High  Church  doctrines  which  is 
observable  in  his  later  works. 

o  2 


196 


MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 


guage,  in  wliich  "words  that  convey  feeling,  and 
words  that  flash  images,  and  words  that  express 
notions,  flow  together  and  whirl,  and  rush  onward 
like  a  stream  at  once  rapid  and  full  of  eddies  "* — a 
stream  which  here  and  there  has  "  islets  of  smooth 
water  "  reflecting  all  that  is  lovely  in  earth  and  sky, 
but  which  must  inevitably  sweep  some  impurities 
upon  its  surface,  and  in  which  there  must  sometimes 
be  shallow  backwaters,  and  stains  of  discoloration 
from  the  many  soils  through  which  it  flows.t 

8.  But,  for  these  reasons,  it  is  not  in  his  theo- 
logical treatises,  dazzling  as  is  their  eloquence  and 
amazing  as  is  their  ingenuity,  that  Taylor  is  seen 
at  his  best.:]:     His  true  position,  his  immortal  sig- 


*  Coleridge's  'Apologetic  Pre- 
face to  Fire,  Famine,  and  Slaugh- 
ter.' Elsewhere  ('  Notes  on  Eng- 
lish Divines,'  i.  203)  he  talks  of 
the  "  costly  gems  that  glitter, 
loosely  set,  on  the  chain  armour 
of  his  polemic  Pegasus,  that  ex- 
pands his  wings  chiefly  to  fly 
off  from  the  field  of  battle,  the 
stroke  of  whose  hoof  the  very 
rock  cannot  resist,  but  beneath 
the  stroke  of  which  the  opening 
rock  sends  forth  a  Hippocrene." 

t  As  specimens  of  the  incau- 
tious breadth  of  statement  into 
which  he  is  led  by  his  power  of 
language  and  ardour  of  contro- 
versy, we  may  notice  his  exagge- 
rated views  of  the  uncertainty 
of  the  meaning  of  Scripture  in 


the  'Liberty  of  Prophesying;' 
and  the  extravagant  importance 
which  he  attached  to  confirma- 
tion ('  Disc,  of  Confirm.').  In  both 
instances  he  carries  a  true  prin- 
ciple much  too  far. 

X  I  may  be  thought  guilty 
of  some  temerity  in  the  above 
passage  by  those  who  have  read 
the  remarks  of  the  late  Bishop 
Thirlwall  (' Eemains,'  ii.  352), 
in  which  he  seems  to  repudiate 
the  admission  of  such  defects  as 
I  have  mentioned.  Yet  I  can 
liardly  think  that  the  great 
Bishop  would  have  been  able  to 
deny  the  possibility  of  a  fair 
justification  of  all  tliat  I  have 
noticed,  and  most  certainly  he 
would    not    involve  me  in  the 


JEREMY   TAYLOR.  197 

nificance  for  the  history  of  the  Church  of  God, 
does  not  lie  in  his  voluminous  controversies,  but  in 
his  glorious  eloquence  and  holy  devotion.  For  tlie 
subtler  technicalities  of  school  divinity  he  had,  in 
spite  of  his  Cambridge  training,  no  liking  and  no 
speciality."^  He  felt  a  perfectly  justifiable  im- 
patience for  what  Milton  calls  '*  the  subdichotomies 
of  petty  schisms."  He  had  indeed  read  the  best 
authorities  about  them,  but  he  liad  read  them  witli 
no  intense  concentration,  and  by  no  means  passes 
them  through  the  alembic  of  his  own  understand- 
ing. His  *  Liberty  of  Prophesying,'  and  '  Dissuasive 
against  Popery,'  show  how  extremely  small  was  the 
value  which  he  set  upon  the  esoteric  arcana  of 
scholastic  dogma ;  how  thoroughly  convinced  he  was 
(though  he  sometimes  swerved  from  his  own  convic- 
tions) that  in  spite  of  thousands  of  treatises  on 
these  subjects,  "all  that  is  solid  religion,  or  clear 
revelation  about  angels,  about  the  immaculate  con- 


charge  of   ''wantonly  assailing  |  out  of  the  "scheme  of  salvation" 
the  illustrious  dead."  {  (see  '  Works,'  vi.  271).     At  the 

*  "The  way  to  judge  of  religion  i  same  time  there  is  vast  exag- 
is  by  doing  our  duty ;  and  theo-  i  geration  in  Mr.  Hunt's  remark 
logy  is  rather  a  Divine  life  than  ;  that  "  there  are  but  few  doctrines 
a  Divine  knowledge"  (Sermon  ;  in  which  Taylor's  views  would 
before  the  University  of  Dublin,  !  not  exclude  him  from  the  com- 
and  '  Liberty  of  Prophesying,'  mon  pale  of  the  orthodox  in  the 
passim).  In  more  than  one  '  judgment  of  the  majority  of 
passage  he  speaks  with  almost  Christians,  of  whatever  sect  or 
angry  contempt  of  all  endeavours  ,  party"  ('Religious  Thought  in 
to  frame  a  systematic  philosophy  j  England,'  i.  334). 


198      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

ception,  about  original  sin,  could  be  compressed  in 
forty  lines ;"  *  how  sincere  was  liis  advice  to  his 
clergy  to  make  every  day  a  rosary  or  chaplet  of 
good  works,  to  be  presented  to  God  at  night,  but 
to  *'  speak  very  little  of  the  high  and  secret  things 
of  God " !  It  is  not  by  his  purely  theological 
writings  that  he  is  best  known,  or  because  of  them 
that  he  is  most  valued;  and  indeed  it  was  the 
wise  habit  of  his  mind  "to  convert  doctrines  into 
homilies,  and  speculations  into  prayers."  But  he 
never  could  write  otherwise  than  well,  and  even 
the  least  accurate  of  his  theological  treatises  is  yet 
of  value  for  its  digressions,  its  learning,  its  fancy,  its 
imagery,  its  tenderness,  its  insight.  These  are  to 
be  found  even  in  that  great  work,  which,  of  all 
others,  he  most  carefully  revised,  and  on  which  he 
spent  most  time,  because  he  rested  on  it  his  hope  of 
fame  with  posterity — although,  in  reality,  posterity 
cares  less  about  it  than  about  any  of  his  other 
writings — I  mean  the  '  Ductor  Dubitantium.'  f  This 
book  of  casuistry  was  the  direct  fruit  of  his  training 
in  scholastic  methods  and  mediaival  theology;  and 
the  reason  why  it  is  now  neglected  is  because 
casuistry  is  but  the  Talmudism  of  Christianity,  and 
ceases  to  be  valued  when  the  robust  conscience, 
trained  to  personal  communion  with  God,  and  feel- 


*  Ep.  Decl.    to    '  Liberty    of    parable  chapter  on  the  Christian 
Prophesying.'  i  Evidences    ('  Works,'    ix.    158, 

t  See,  for  instance  the  incom-  |  seqq.') 


JEREMY  TAYLOR. 


199 


ing  itself  quite  strong  enough  to  walk  alone,  rejects 
the  interferences  of  auricular  confession.  In  spite 
of  many  redeeming  excellences,  and  especially  the 
introductory  chapters  which  occupy  the  first  book 
*  On  Conscience,'  the  *  Ductor  Dubitantium '  ex- 
hibits Taylor's  worst  defects  of  prolixity,  dubious 
admissions,  questionable  opinions,  haste  and  in- 
distinctness, want  of  depth  and  accuracy,  and 
accumulation  of  authorities  and  quotations  in  lieu 
of  a  close  grapple  with  principles.*  Indeed,  with 
this  elaborate  treatise  the  science  of  casuistry,  in  its 


*  In  spite  of  many  merits,  a  I 
moral  treatise  must  stand  con-  i 
demned,  as  founded  on  indistinct  i 
and  inadequate  premisses,  which  I 
practically  admits,  as  the  'Ductor  | 
Dubitantium'  does,  that  what  is  ; 
morally  wrong  may  be  politically  [ 
right :  which  sanctions  the  use  I 
of  arguments  known  to  be  un- 
tenable (ix.  95);  which  allows  : 
the  aftrighting  of  children  and 
fools  with  mormos  and  bugbears  I 
(ix.  101) ;  which  says  (x.  304) 
that  the  unlawful  proclamations  I 
of  a  true  prince  may  be  published  [ 
by  the  clergy,  &c.    It  is  grievous  [ 
to  think  that  time-servers  like  | 
Sprat  would  l)ave  been  able  to 
shelter   themselves    behind   his 
splendid  authority  in  1G87.     In 
fact,  as  the  *  Ductor  Dubitantium ' 
had  its  main  origin  in  the  condi- 
tion of  things  created  by  a  dan- 
gerous and   evil  sacerdotalism, 
so   whole  sections  of  it  (see  x. 


101-140)  have  (I  fear  it  must 
be  said)  a  perceptibly  Jesuitical 
taint— due,  I  am  confident,  not 
to  Taylor's  nature,  but  to  the 
over-importance  which  he  at- 
tached to  the  endless  and  inju- 
rious cobweb-spinnings  of  Eomish 
and  other  casuists.  He  says,  in 
his  *  Clerus  Domini '  ('  Works,' 
i.  21),  "I  believe  there  are  not 
so  little  as  5000  cases  (of  con- 
science) started  up  among  the 
casuists,  and  for  aught  I  know 
there  may  be  five  thousand 
times  five  thousand."  I  cannot 
at  all  accept  the  eulogy  which 
pronounced  the  '  Ductor  Dubi- 
tantium '  to  be  "  the  greatest 
book  on  Moral  Philosophy  pro- 
duced by  the  English  Cimrch  " 
(Hunt,  'Religious  Thought  in 
England ')  ;  and  even  Dean  IMil- 
man's  estimate  of  it  ('Annals 
of  St.  Paul's,'  p.  344)  seems  too 
favourable. 


200  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 

scholastic  aspects,  and  witli  its  economic  manage- 
ments and  accommodations  of  truth,  may  be  said  to 
have  died  a  natural  death.  The  eloquence  of  Taylor 
was  the  rich  and  illuminated  colophon  at  the  bottom 
of  a  dreary  and  little  profitable  page.  In  the  next 
work  which  touched  upon  the  subject^  namely, 
*  Cumberland's  Treatise  on  the  Laws  of  Nature,' 
"  we  find  ourselves,"  says  Hallam,  "  in  a  new  world 
of  moral  reasoning;  schoolmen  and  Fathers,  ca- 
nonists and  casuists,  have  vanished  like  ghosts  at 
the  first  daylight."  * 

9.  Among  the  theologic  teachings  of  Taylor  must, 
however,  be  classed  that  magnificent  appeal  to 
Christian  charity,  the  immortal  *  Liberty  of  Pro- 
phesying.' Had  he  never  written  any  other  book, 
the  Church  of  God  would  have  owed  him  a  debt 
that  can  never  be  repaid.  It  achieved  for  the  cause 
of  toleration  what  Milton's  splendid  *  Areopagitica ' 
did  for  the  "  Liberty  of  Unlicensed  Printing."  It 
was  published  ten  years  after,!  and  was  no  doubt 
more  or  less  directly  influenced  by,  Chillingworth's 
'Keligion  of  Protestants;'  but  though  Taylor 
would  have  exulted  in  Chillingworth's  passionate 
exclamation,  '*  Take  away  this  persecuting,  burning, 


*  Hallam's  '  Literature  of  Eu- 
rope,' iii.  400.  His  remarks  on 
p.  392  are  severe,  but  not  so 
severe  as  to  be  unjust. 

t  'The    Keligion   of   Protes- 


on  Schism,'  in  1642 ;  '  Liberty 
of  Prophesying,'  in  1647;  Still- 
ingfleet's  'Irenicum'  (a  far  in- 
ferior performance),  and  IMilton 
on  •  Civil  Power  in  Ecclesiastical 


tants '  appeared  in  1637  ;  '  Hales  :  Causes/  in  1659. 


JEREMY  TAYLOR. 


201 


cursing,  damning  of  men  for  not  subscribing  the 
words  of  men  as  the  words  of  God,"*  he  deals,  far 
more  closely  than  either  Chillingworth  or  Hales  has 
done,  with  the  then-novel  subject  of  religious  to- 
leration,t  and  his  is  the  greatest  work  on  this 
immensely  important  topic  ever  written  by  an 
ordained  member  of  the  Christian  Church.  Nor 
do  I  see  any  reason  to  doubt  his  own  express  state- 
ment, which  some  writers  have  so  rudely  set  aside, 
that  it  was  one  of  his  aims  to  secure  freedom  of 
thought,  and  therefore  of  worship,  for  the  Church  of 
England ;  and  that,  as  against  the  Presbyterians,  he 


*  '  Keligion  of  Protestants,' 
iv.  §  17. 

t  That  Taylor  was  not  un- 
acquainted with  the  writings  of 
"  the  ever  -  memorable  Hales  " 
appears  from  his  borrowing  the 
legend  of  the  gnomes  men- 
tioned by  Agricola  ('  Works,' 
viii.  526).  And  when  he  calls 
the  term  heresy  a  mere  terricu- 
lamentum,  he  may  have  remem- 
bered that  Hales  called  heresy 
and  schism,  "theological  scare- 
crows," (Hales'  '  Eemains,' 
Works,  vi.  516.  See  Tulloch's 
'  Rational  Theology  in  Eng- 
land,' i.  372-416.)  Erasmus 
too,  though  not  quoted  in  the 
'  Liberty  of  Prophesying,'  had 
yet  distinctly  formulated  its 
main  principle.  "Summa  nos- 
tras religionis  pax  est  et  unani- 
mitas.    Ea  vix  constare  poterit 


nisi  de  quam  paucissimis  defini- 
amus,  et  in  multis  relinquamus 
suum  cuique  judicium"  (0pp. 
Ed.  Bas.,  p.  1162).  It  does  not 
seem  to  have  been  Taylor's  way 
to  refer  frequently  to  modern 
writers.  He  does  indeed  quote 
Hooker  not  unfrequently,  and 
always  in  terms  of  warm  admira- 
tion ;  but  though  he  had  evi- 
dently read  the  discourses  of 
John  Smith,  the  Cambridge  Pla- 
tonist  ('Works,'  viii.  374-379), 
and  Henry  Smith,  "the  silver- 
tongued,"  yet  he  does  not  men- 
tion them  by  name.  It  is  strange, 
too,  that  he  never  once  refers 
to  Spenser,  of  whom  IMilton  so 
boldly  said,  "Whom  I  dare  be 
known  to  think  a  better  teacher 
than  Scotus  and  Aquinas'"  ('Are- 
opagitiea '). 


202 


MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 


found  a  favourable  opportunity  for  doing  so  in  the 
rise  of  the  Independents.*  Nor  is  it  quite  fair  to 
say,  as  even  some  of  his  warmest  admirers  have 
done,  that  in  the  hour  of  his  Cliurch's  triumph — an 
expression,  indeed,  which  hardly  represents  the 
state  of  Ireland  in  1660  and  the  following  years 
— he  abandoned  the  views  which  he  had  advo- 
cated with  such  courageous  force.  It  is  true  that 
in  his  later  years  his  charity  and  toleration  were 
very  sorely  tried;  and  in  his  'Via  Intelligentise,' 
a  famous  sermon  preached  before  the  University 
of  Dublin  in  1662,  and  still  more  in  that  preached 
at  the  opening  of  the  Irish  Parliament  in  1661, 
he  modifies  rather  than  retracts  his  earlier  prin- 
ciples, t      The  needle  might  sometimes  quiver  and 


*  Hal] am,  '  Literature  of  Eu- 
rope,' ii.  353,  accuses  Taylor  of 
"some  want  of  ingenuousness" 
in  Taylor's  assertion,  in  the 
dedication  of  this  work,  that 
he  wrote  the  book  to  plead 
for  liberty  of  conscience  on  be- 
half of  the  Church  of  England 
in  time  of  persecution  ;  and 
it  is  quite  true  that  the  class 
of  controversies  with  which 
Taylor  is  mainly  dealing  is 
not  that  which  arose  between 
the  Episcopal  Church  and  her 
enemies ;  but  Taylor  might  well 
answer  that  if  toleration  were  an 
admitted  principle  in  the  cases 
which    he    directly    argued,  it 


would  apply   a  fortiori  to   the 
claims  of  the  Church. 

t  '  Works.'  viii.  367.  The  re- 
marks of  Coleridge  ('  Notes  on 
English  Divines,'  i.  209)  are  un- 
warrantably harsh.  The  sup- 
posed inconsistency  has  been,  to 
say  the  least,  grossly  exaggerated. 
Without  further  evidence  I  sim- 
ply disbelieve  the  story  of  his 
buying  up  and  burning  as  many 
copies  of  the  book  as  he  could  get. 
The  second  edition  was  published 
while  he  was  Bishop  (Heber'8 
'Life,'p.xxxiii.) ;  and  in  his  'Dis- 
suasive from  Popery,'  published 
as  late  as  1667,  he  reiterates  sub- 
stantially the  same  views. 


JEREMY   TAYLOR.  203 

be  deflected,  but,  on  tlie  whole,  it  pointed  true. 
And  the  slicfht  occasional  deflection  is  no  more 
than  we  should  have  naturally  expected  in  one 
who,  though  eminently  virtuous,  was  yet  eminently 
many-sided  in  intellect  and  flexible  in  disposition, 
and  who  in  all  his  controversies  was  so  intensely 
susceptible  to  the  influences  of  the  moment,  as  to  be 
swayed  almost  as  powerfully  by  his  feelings  as  by 
his  understanding.  Nor  must  it  be  forgotten  that,  if 
he  seems  to  appeal  to  civil  authority  in  matters  of 
opinion,  he  was  living  in  a  position  where  his  very 
life  was  in  constant  danger,  and  where  his  peace 
was  destroyed  by  incessant  and  virulent  attacks. 
But  that,  in  his  fundamental  position,  he  was  as 
dauntless  and  sincere,  as  in  personal  conduct  he  was 
conciliatory,  courageous,  and  charitable  ;  that  he  did 
hold  most  firmly  to  the  last  that  heresy  is  not  a 
mere  "  error  in  intellectu "  but  a  "  contumacia  in 
Yoluntate" — "an  act  of  the  will,"  as  Hales  says, 
"  not  of  the  reason  " — a  wicked  opinion,  not  a  mere 
speculative  mistake  ;  that  the  name  *'  heretic "  is 
often  a  mere  terriculamentiLm  to  frighten  people 
from  their  belief ;  that  half  the  questions  which  have 
agitated  and  divided  Churches  are  as  superfluous  as 
the  mutual  hatreds  which  they  have  engendered 
have  been  reprehensible ;  that  the  Apostles'  Creed 
is  for  Christendom  the  sole  necessary  basis  of  unity, 
and  that  nothing  beyond  it  ought  to  be  required  of 
others  as  a  necessity  of  faith ;  that  it  is  wrong  to 


204  MASTERS   IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

make  the  way  to  Heaven  narrower  than  God  has 
made  it;  and  that  if  God  will  not  be  angry  with 
men  for  being  invincibly  deceived,  neither  ought 
men  to  be  angry  with  each  other — this,  I  think,  is 
demonstrable  from  his  latest  writings.  It  is  little 
short  of  a  grave  injustice  to  doubt  that  Jeremy 
Taylor,  in  spite  of  a  few  vacillating  expressions  due 
to  his  habit  of  realising  both  sides  of  an  argument, 
did  embrace  these  truths  with  all  the  sincerity  of 
his  heart  as  he  had  defended  them  with  all  the 
splendour  of  his  intellect.*  And  would  to  God  that 
the  Church  realised  them  as  fully  and  deeply  now, 
as  assuredly  she  ever  needs  the  lesson !  Since  the 
want  of  a  heartfelt  charity  has  ever  been  a  fatal 
source  of  weakness  and  disunion  ;  since  few  of  us  are 
proficients  in  the  unselfishness  which  can  respect  the 
position  of  an  opponent,  and  the  candour  which  can 
admit  that  not  one  of  us  has  a  monopoly  of  truth ; 
since  few  of  us  display  the  love  which  can  forgive 
even  a  difference  of  opinion ;  it  is  certain  that  the 
"  Liberty  of  Prophesying,"  though  its  concession  of 
civil  toleration  is  less  complete  than  experience  has 
shown  to  be  desirable,  will  always  be  regarded  as  a 


*  How  terribly  Taylor's  tolera- 
tion was  tried  may  be  seen  from 
bis  letters.  The  Presbyterians 
of  his  diocese  "  appointed  a 
committee  of  Scotch  spiders,  to 


poison  out  of  his  books,"  "  threat- 
ened to  murder  him,"  "  dis- 
charged against  him  all  their 
ordnance  of  bitter  words  and 
horrid  threatenin£;s,"  '"  slandered 


see  if  they  can  gather  or  make  i  him,"  &c.,  &c.  ('  Life,'  ciii.). 


JEREMY   TAYLOR.  205 

book  whicli  rendered   a   courageous  and   immortal 
service  to  the  Church  of  God.* 

10.  Nevertheless,  it  is  when  Jeremy  Taylor  leaves 
altogether  the  regions  of  scholasticism,  controversy, 
and  rigid  dogma;  when  he  is  appealing  directly 
to  the  imagination  and  to  the  religious  emotion ; 
**  when  he  escapes  into  the  devotional,  as  into  a 
green  meadowland  with  springs  and  rivulets  and 
sheltering  groves,  where  he  leads  his  flock  like  a 
shepherd,"  t  that  he  is  most  incomparably  great. 
It  is  when  he  is  writing  on  the  duties  of  a  holy  life 
— in  his  prayers,  his  sermons,  liis  '  Golden  Grove,' 
his  '  Holy  Living  and  Dying,'  his  *  Life  of  Christ,' 
that  his  lips  are  touched,  as  it  were,  by  the  seraphim 
with  coals  of  fire  from  the  altar ;  and  that  his  very 
faults,  or  what  to  the  pedantries  of  formal  criticism 
might  be  so  regarded,  become  like  merits  and 
glories  because  they  become  parts  of  his  dear 
and  inimitable  self. J     His  imperfections,  then,  make 


*  Taylor  must  have  known  ■  analysis  of  the  contents  of  this 
that  it  would  be  distasteful  to  i  great  work,  which,  however, 
the  bigots  of  his  party,  and  I  '  may  be  found  in  Mr.  Hunt's 
can  easily  believe  that  a  book  '  '  Religious  Thought  in  England,' 
which  Milton  must  have  ardently  i.  334-^341 ;  and  Principal  Tul- 
admired  would  be  disliked  and  loch's  '  Rational  Theology.' 
all  but  disavowed  by  Charles  I.  '  f  Coleridge's  '  Xotes  on  Eng- 
See  Heber's  '  Life,'  p.  cclxii.,  lish  Divines,'  p.  256. 
quoting  from  Sir  P.  Warwick's  +  "  I  shall  not  be  ashamed  to 
'  Memoirs  *  his  account  of  an  say  that  I  am  weary  aiid  toiled 
interview  with  the  king.  Space  in  rowing  up  and  down  the  seas 
forbids  me  to  give  any  sketch  or    of  questions  which  the  interests 


206 


MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 


US  feel  for  him  a  sort  of  human  love,  which  we 
could  not  feel  for  a  writer  of  cold  regularity,  fault- 
less nullity,  or  colourless  perfection.  And  these  are 
evidentiy  the  writings  in  which,  to  adopt  his  own 
beautiful  language,  he  can  "  slide  towards  his  ocean  of 
God  and  infinity  with  a  certain  and  silent  motion;"* 
and  in  which,  as  Milton  also  loved  to  do,  he  can 
contemplate  the  bright  countenance  of  truth  in  the 
mild  and  dewy  air  of  delightful  studies,  so  that  in 
these  he  is  most  happy  and  most  at  home.  Take, 
for  instance,  his  Sermons.t  We  in  this  age  of  hurry, 
excitement,  pressure,  fuss ;  we  whose  bells  are  in- 
cessantly ringing  ;  whose  leisure  is  never  sacred  from 
the  most  frivolous  interruptions;  whose  sympathies 
are  constantly  upon  the  strain ;  who  are  harassed  by 
the  immense  multiplicity  of  social  and  charitable 
organisations ;  we  who,  in  consequence,  are  but  the 
"  pickers-up  of  Learning's  crumbs ;"  we  who,  in  the 
Church  of  the  present  day,  can  hardly  count  five 
profoundly  learned  men  ;  stand  incapably  amazed 
before  the  sermons  of  the  17th  century,  in  their 
inexhaustible  knowledge,  their  prodigious  fertility, 
their  "  ladea  uhertas."     An  ordinarv  sermon  of  the 


of  Christendom  have  commenced" 
(Dedication  to  '  Great  Exem- 
plar')- 

*  Sermon  on  the  death  of 
Lady  Carbery. 

t  It  is  somewhat  singular  that 


his  Sermons  contain  so  few  spe- 
cific allusions  to  special  feasts 
and  fasts,  when  we  read  liis 
Rule  Ixi.  of  his  '  Eules  and 
Advices  to  the  Clergy.' 


JEEEMY   TAYLOR.  207 

present  day,  compared  in  point  of  splendour,  variety, 
and  erudition,  with  a  sermon  of  Jeremy  Taylor's, 
is  like  a  squalid  brick  Bethesda  in  some  poverty- 
stricken  Dissenting  village  in  comparison  with  the 
liigh-embowed  roofs  and  storied  windows  of  a  Gothic 
cathedral.  What  a  range  of  reading — Hebraic,  Hel- 
lenic, theological,  literary — we  encounter  in  these 
discourses  at  Golden  Grove!  The  historians,  the 
philosophers,  the  orators  of  Greece  ;  the  poets,  the 
satirists,  the  epigrammatists  of  Eome;  the  Greek 
Fathers,  the  Latin  Fathers,  the  schoolmen,  the  ca- 
suists, the  scholars ;  the  Italian  poets  ;  the  classicists 
of  the  Eenaissance ;  French  romances,  Arabic  le- 
gends ;  this  fjLvpi6vov<;  avrjp  seems  to  be  familiar  with 
them  all !  And  what  wealth  of  illustration  !  Persian 
kings  glittering  among  the  satraps  of  Asia ;  Roman 
banquets ;  Chian  wines  in  purest  crystal ;  Lamiee 
that  turn  to  serpents;  Libyan  lions;  Pannonian 
bears ;  stags  whose  knees  are  frozen  in  icy  streams ; 
statues  decapitated  to  make  room  for  other  heads ; 
"  poor  Attilius  Aviola  "  (as  though  every  one  knew 
all  about  him);  the  "  condited  bellies  of  the  Scarus ;" 
"drinking  of  healths  by  the  numeral  letters  of 
Philenium's  name;"  the  golden  and  alabaster  houses 
of  Egyptian  Thebes  ;  the  quaint,  the  pedantic,  the 
imaginative,  the  marvellous,  the  grotesque; — these 
alternate  with  exquisitely  natural  images  derived 
from  the  green  fields,  and  the  violet,  and  the 
thrush's  song.      In    one   single   passage,   speaking 


208      MASTEKS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

of  superstition,  he  refers  to  Diomedon  and  the 
Battle  of  Arginusae,  to  Chabrias,  to  the  Gregorian 
Calendar,  to  the  death  of  Aristodemus,  to  the  eclipse 
that  frightened  Nicias,  to  the  sweating  statues  of 
Kome,  to  the  mass  at  Eheims  during  which  Pope 
Eugenius  spilled  a  few  drops  out  of  the  chalice,  and 
the  mass  of  requiem  sung  by  Thomas  a  Becket  on 
the  day  of  his  reconciliation  with  Henry  II.*  In 
another  passage,  to  show  us  that  fathers  are  often 
unfortunate  in  their  children,  he  refers  in  a  breath 
to  Chabrias,  Germanicus,  M.  Aurelius,  Hortensius, 
Q.  Fab.  Maximus,  Scipio  Afiicanus,  Moses,  and 
Samuel ;  and  in  yet  another  he  illustrates  frivolity  of 
occupation  by  Domitian  catching  flies ;  Nero  fiddling ; 
Aeropus,  King  of  Macedonia,  making  lanterns; 
Harcatius,  King  of  Parthia,  catching  moles ;  Biantes, 
King  of  Lydia,  filing  needles;  and  the  patriarch 
Theophylact  spending  his  time  in  a  stable  of  horses.t 
Call  these  sermons  Asiatic,  J  Khodian,  cumbrous, 
pedantic,  discursive,  if  you  will:  let  every  puny 
critic  take  their  measure  with  his  yard  wand,  and 
fathom  their  ocean  with  his  tape, — the  fact  remains 
that  in  this  and  all  other  languages  they  continue  to 
be,  in  their  own  class,  unparalleled.  Let  us  even 
admit  that  he  is  sometimes  borne  away  by  the  im- 
petuosity of  his  own  rhetoric,  and  mistakes  the 
amplifications   of  fancy   for   the   approximation   to 


*  '  Sermon  of  Godly  Fear,'  pt.  iii.  +  '  Holy  Living,'  i.  9. 

X  Hallam's  '  Literature  of  Europe,'  ii.  360. 


JEREMY   TAYLOR.  209 

tnitli ; — let  us,  for  instance,  admit  with  Coleridge  * 
that  he  could  never  have  paused  to  realise  what  was 
meant  by  the  Tartarean  drench  in  which,  in  his 
*  Second  Sermon  on  the  Advent  to  Judgment,'  t  he 
drowns  his  page;  and  that  the  agglomeration  of 
horrible  torments  in  which  he  revels  are  but,  in 
reality,  "mere  bubbles,  and  flashes,  and  electrical 
apparitions  from  the  magic  caldron  of  a  fervid  and 
ebullient  fancy,  constantly  fuelled  by  an  unexampled 
opulence  of  language ; " — stil],  as  a  preacher,  as  a 
devotional  writer,  none — not  even  Bishop  Hall, 
not  even  Bishop  Andrewes,  not  even  Archbishop 
Leighton,  not  even  Bishop  Wilson — at  all  equal 
him.  Only  the  *  Theologia  Germanica,'  the  *  Imi- 
tatio  Christi,'  and  the  ^  Pilgrim's  Progress,'  can 
compare  with  his  'Holy  Living  and  Dying,'  in  the 
wide  influence  which  they  have  exercised;  and 
while  this  treatise  equals  them  in  sweetness  and 
unction,  in  pathos  and  devotion,  it  far  transcends 
them  in  eloquence,  imaginativeness  and  erudition. 
Nor  must  we  forget  that  it  may  reach  some  who  feel 
that  even  in  the  '  Imitatio  Christi '  there  is  a  lack 
of  some  elements  which  they  require,  and  the  pre- 
sence of  some  which  they  could  gladly  relinquish. 


*  Apologetic  Preface.      Hap-  ,  spuriously  assigned    to  Taylor, 
pily  the  frightful  passage  on  hell  i  and  really  compiled  from  a  Spa- 
tormentS;  quoted  by  Dr.  Newman,  I  nish  book   (see   Eden's   note  to 
and  after  him  by  Mr.  Lecky  and     Heber's  '  Life,'  p.  vii. 
Mr.  MacColl,  is  from  the  '  Consi-  I      f  Works,  iv.  39,  42. 
derations  on  the  state  of  Man,*  I 

[king's  coll.]  P 


210  MASTEKS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

When  John  Wesley  had  laid  aside  the  exquisite 
manual  of  the  Mediaeyal  Mystic  because  it  failed 
to  give  him  perfect  satisfaction,  it  was  the  *  Holy 
Living  and  Dying '  which  he  took  up ;  and  when  he 
had  read  the  chapter  on  "  Purity  of  Intention,"  "  in- 
stantly," he  says,  "  I  resolved  to  dedicate  all  my  life 
to  God,  all  my  thoughts,  and  words,  and  actions; 
being  thoroughly  convinced  that  there  was  no  me- 
dium, but  that  eveiy  part  of  life  must  either  be  a 
sacrifice  to  God  or  myself."  And  who  can  estimate 
the  fruits  of  Taylor's  influence,  even  had  he  achieved 
nothing  more  than  to  kindle  for  the  Church  of 
Christ  that  mighty  breath  of  reviving  inspiration 
which  is  symbolised  by  the  name  of  John  Wesley? 
Although  I  have  freely  pointed  out  the  defects 
observable  in  the  writings  of  this  beloved  bishop — 
the  true  son  of  the  English  Church  at  one  of  its 
stormiest  epochs — yet  I  doubt  whether  we  shall  not 
as  soon  see  another  Shakspeare  as  another  Jeremy 
Taylor.  To  the  acquisition  of  a  learning  such  as 
his,  this  age — hard,  exacting,  jealous ;  without  con- 
centration, without  self-recollection,  without  leisure, 
utilitarian ;  mistaking  a  superficial  activity  and  a 
worrying  multiplicity  of  details  for  true  deep  pro- 
gress ;  quite  content  with  vapid  shibboleths,  archaic 
ritualism,  or  emotional  emptiness ;  jealous  of  a 
labour  which,  because  it  is  retired,  is  mistaken  for 
idleness,  and  robbing  every  one  whom  it  can  of  all 
means  for  the   exhaustive  pursuit   of   learning — is 


JEREMY   TAYLOR.  211 

wholly  unfavourable.  Two  hundred  years  have 
passed  since  the  publication  of  the  *  Liberty  of  Pro- 
phesying,' and  we  are  stiil  quarrelling  about  copes 
and  chasubles,  and  making  it  a  matter  of  import- 
ance whether  the  Sacramental  bread  should  be  cut 
round  or  square.  When  men  are  absorbed  in  such 
controversies,  and  in  the  grinding  littlenesses  of 
endless  and  elaborate  agencies,  often  wholly  dis- 
proportionate in  number,  and  in  the  toil  they 
involve,  to  any  possible  good  which  they  can 
achieve,  there  is  little  possibility  of  a  learned  clergy 
— there  is  indeed  a  fatal  certainty  that  such  will 
not  be  produced.  Let  us  be,  at  any  rate,  thankful 
fur  an  heritage  which,  in  all  probability,  will  never 
be  renewed ;  let  us  profit  by  the  holy  writings,  let 
us  do  homage  to  the  great  and  honoured  name,  of 
this  eloquent  master  in  Israel ;  and  if  we  be  some- 
times troubled  with  sad  apprehensions  that  God  is 
removing  the  candlestick  of  our  Church — "  for  why 
should  He  not,  when  men  themselves  put  the  light 
out,  and  pull  the  stars  from  their  orbs,  so  hastening 
the  day  of  judgment  ?" — let  us  remember  that  He 
"  deigned  to  put  a  portion  of  the  holy  fire  into  a 
repository  which  might  help  to  rekindle  the  incense, 
when  it  shall  please  God  religion  shall  return,  and 
all  his  servants  shall  sing,  ^  In  convertendo  captivi- 
tatem  Sion  '  with  a  voice  of  Eucharist."  * 


Dedication  to  '  The  Great  ExompJar.' 

p  2 


JOHN    PEARSON. 


Different  classes  of  theologians — Pearson's  Life — Systematic 
theology — Scholasticism;  effect  of  the  Eenaissance  upon  it, 
and  Pearson's  relation  to  it— His  advice  to  students  of  tlieology^ 
and  statement  of  his  own  position — His  opinion  of  the  Eeformed 
Churches — Judgment  on  Descartes — Love  of  fixed  principles 
and  methods — Exposition  of  the  Creed — ViNDiciiE  Episto- 
LARUM  S.  Ignatii — Other  works — Conclusion. 

Ix  all  the  variety  which  theology  presents,  we  may 
recognise,  I  think,  four  main  divisions.  There  are 
great  original  thinkers,  who  have  brought  into  pro- 
minence at  a  critical  time  some  great  and  fertile 
truth,  which  has  had  a  large  share  in  moulding  the 
views  of  succeeding  generations.  Of  this  class  are, 
in  our  own  Church,  Hooker  and  Butler.  Then,  again, 
there  are  men  who,  without  being  exactly  original, 
have  cast  about  the  common  trutlis  of  our  most  holy 
faith  the  undying  lustre  of  genius ;  who  have  culled 
from  all  fields  of  science  and  learning  flowers  with 
which  to  decorate  the  shrine  of  Christ.  Such  men 
were  Jeremy  Taylor  and  Barrow.  Then  there  is, 
again,  a  third  class — that  of  those  who  have  suc- 
cessfully systematised  the  mass  of  theology  existing 
in  their  time ;  and  yet,  again,  a  fourth,  less  showy, 
but  certainly  not  less  useful,  than  any  of  the  rest — 
that  of  the  scholars  who  devote  themselves  to  theo- 


214  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

logy;  who  give  to  the  Sacred  Scriptures,  and  to 
the  other  records  of  the  ancient  Church,  the  same 
care,  the  same  accuracy,  the  same  cultivated  dis- 
cernment, by  which  many  have  won  fame  in  other 
fields.  This  class  is,  I  say,  certainly  not  less  im- 
portant than  any  other ;  for  the  Church  is  a  society 
having  a  continuous  history  and  continuous  records ; 
our  knowledge  of  the  history  depends  upon  the 
records.  If  we  accept  false  records  for  true,  or 
interpret  true  records  falsely,  our  conceptions  of  the 
Church  are  marred  and  distorted.  Few  things 
strike  us  more  in  the  history  of  the  Middle  Ages 
than  the  mischief  done  by  the  absence  of  criticism 
and  exegesis,  whether  in  relation  to  the  Scriptures 
or  to  other  documents  recognised  as  authorities ; 
almost  any  text  of  any  ancient  book  was  held 
sufficient  to  defend  an  established  usage.  If  it  had 
then  been  known,  as  it  is  now,  that  the  supposed 
Decretals  of  early  Popes  were  forgeries,  many  con- 
troversies would  have  been  much  simplified  and 
shortened.  It  was  one  of  the  tasks  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  to  apply  a  remedy  to  this  state  of 
things ;  the  records  were  examined ;  men  began  to 
apply  to  Christian  literature  the  critical  and  exege- 
tic  acumen  which  they  had  acquired  in  researches 
among  pagan  authors;  spurious  works  began  to  be 
separated  from  genuine  ;  interpretations  founded, 
perhaps,  on  some  defective  Latin  translation  of  a 
Greek  original,  began  to  be  discarded  in  favour  of 


JOHN   PEAESOX.  215 

those  of  scholars  familiar  with  the  grammar  and 
usage  of  the  original  tongue.  In  short,  that  siftiug 
of  the  wheat  from  the  chaff  of  ancient  literature, 
which  has  had  so  vast  an  influence  on  the  progress  of 
Christian  theology,  was  begun.  Some  of  the  soundest 
intellect  in  Europe  gave  themselves  to  this  work. 

Among  Englishmen  of  the  seventeenth  century 
probably  tlie  ablest  representative  at  once  of  sys- 
tematic theology  and  of  scholarship  was  John 
Pearson. 

Pearson  was,  like  so  many  other  distinguished 
English  scholars,  the  son  of  a  country  clergyman, 
himself  in  his  day  a  man  of  some  distinction.  He 
was  born  in  1612,  the  birth-year  of  Jeremy  Taylor; 
he  was  educated  at  Eton  and  at  King's  College,  Cam- 
bridge. It  is  worth  notice  that  he,  too,  laid  a  poetic 
leaf  on  the  hearse  of  the  beloved  Edward  King,  the 
Lycidas  of  Milton's  well-known  elegy.  His  verses 
are,  to  say  the  trnth,  only  the  correct  production  of 
a  scholar  who  was  no  poet.  But  even  if  he  had 
been  gifted  with  poetic  fire,  the  storms  of  a  few  years 
later  might  well  have  darkened  the  golden  light  of 
fancy  and  imagination  in  their  ominous  clouds. 

Pearson's  early  life  just  covers  the  period  in  which 
the  distinctive  principles  generally  recognised  as 
Anglican  were  acquiring  firmness  and  consistency. 
Many,  no  doubt,  among  the  leading  Reformers  had 
always  clung  to  the  precedents  and  authority  of  the 
Primitive  Church,  but  it  was  not  until  the  davs  of 


216      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

Hooker  that  the  school  can  be  said  to  have  been 
definitely  formed  which  gave  due  weight  to  Scrip- 
ture, to  primitive  antiquity,  to  reason  and  to  general 
learning ;  which  opposed  on  the  one  hand  the  extra- 
vagance of  individual  interpretation  regardless  of 
all  precedent,  however  sacred  and  universal,  and, 
on  the  other,  renounced  the  sole  authority  of 
Rome  ;  the  school  which  defended  earnestly  the 
ancient  doctrines  of  the  Catholic  Church  against 
corrupters  or  innovators,  and  clung  to  the  time- 
honoured  episcopal  form  of  Church  -  government, 
without  condemning  in  one  wide  sentence  all  who 
were  unable  to  adopt  their  views. 

How  the  storm  which  for  a  time  overwhelmed  the 
old  landmarks  affected  a  man  brought  up  in  the  best 
traditions  of  the  English  Church,  attached  to  her 
not  merely  by  the  subtle  bonds  of  social  influence, 
but  by  the  firm  convictions  of  a  strong  mind  already 
fortified  by  a  wide  knowledge  of  antiquity,  we  may 
see  in  a  Cambridge  sermon  of  the  year  1643, 
preached  just  before  the  opening  of  the  Westminster 
Assembly,  when  the  most  cherished  institutions  of 
the  Church  of  England  were  in  evident  jeopardy ; 
when  it  became  apparent  that  men  who  had  little 
respect  for  learning  and  tradition  were  for  a  time  to 
have  the  upper  hand,  and  that  the  venerable  offices 
of  public  worship  were  for  a  time  to  cease.  Here 
the  zealous  Churchman,  still  in  the  flush  of  early 
manhood,  gave  vent  to  his  indignation.      ''If  the 


JOHN   PEARSON.  217 

dominant  party  would  rob  the  clergy  of  their  learn- 
ing," he  exclaims,  "  it  hath  been  done  before.  Alas ! 
the  apostate  Julian  would  be  their  predecessor.'* 
And  "  the  innocent  prayers,  what  have  they  done  ? 
Did  the  authors  give  their  bodies  to  the  fire  that 
their  books  should  be  burned  ?  Did  reverend  Cran- 
mer,  therefore,  first  sacrifice  his  hand,  because  it  had 
a  part  in  the  Liturgy  ?"  Indignation  for  once  made 
his  words  burn,  but  generally,  in  the  midst  of  dis- 
turbance, he  remains  calm.  When  he  mingles  in  the 
strife  of  words,  it  is  to  reason  and  not  to  rail.  In 
that  dusty  atmosphere  of  combat  he  can  still  choose 
the  best  weapons,  and  take  his  stand  on  defensible 
ground. 

Pearson  was  not  one  of  those  headstrong  persons 
who,  if  they  cannot  do  all  that  they  would,  will  do 
nothing  at  all.  He  could  not  restore  in  the  churches 
during  the  Commonwealth  the  use  of  the  old  prayers 
which  he  so  heartily  loved,  but  what  he  could,  he 
did ;  he  became  lecturer  in  one  of  the  City  churches, 
and  tauglit  the  truth  in  such  a  way  as  the  times 
permitted.  The  story  is  told  of  his  contemporary. 
Archbishop  Leigh  ton,  that  when  he  was  asked  by 
some  in  authority,  whether  he  preached  to  the  times, 
he  replied,  "  tliat  when  so  many  preached  to  the 
times,  it  might  be  permitted  to  one  poor  brother  to 
preach  for  eternity."  Pearson  was  very  unlike 
Archbishop  Leigliton,  but  in  this  he  seems  to  have 
been  like  him,  that  in  the  midst  of  men  who  too 


218 


MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY: 


often  allowed  some  speck  or  mote  near  at  hand  to 
obscure  their  whole  horizon,  he  gave  all  his  energy 
and  learning  to  teach  and  enforce  the  great  common 
verities  of  Christianity.  It  needs  some  acquaint- 
ance with  the  theological  literature  of  the  time  to 
appreciate  the  clear-sightedness  and  force  of  cha- 
racter which  led  Pearson  to  expound  to  the  congre- 
gation of  St.  Clement's,  Eastcheap,  the  several  articles 
of  the  xipostles'  Creed,  and  to  illustrate  them  with  a 
more  choice  and  exquisite  learning  than  was  then  at 
the  command  of  any  other  Englishman.  It  is  strange, 
that  a  work  which  is,  within  its  limits,  the  most 
perfect  and  complete  production  of  English  theology, 
should  have  been  in  its  origin  no  more  than  a  col- 
lection of  parish  lectures,  published  with  the  notes 
of  the  author. 

After  the  Eestoration  Pearson  received  the  honours 
in  the  Church  of  England  which  he  had  fairly 
earned ;  he  took  a  prominent  part  in  the  Savoy 
Conference  ;  he  was  chosen  to  one  of  the  Theological 
Professorships  at  Cambridge,  and  appointed  by  the 
Crown  to  the  Mastership  of  Trinity  College;  he 
ended  his  days  as  Bishop  of  Chester.*  He  has 
been   of  late   years  commemorated  by  a  beautiful 


*  The  following  are  the  prin- 
cipal dates  in  Bi,<hop  Pearson's 
life:— Born,  Feb.  28,  161§;  Fel- 
low of  King's  College,  Cam- 
bridge, 1634;  Lecturer  at  St. 
Clement's,     Eastcheap,     1654  ; 


Archdeacon  of  Surrey,  1 660 ; 
Master  of  Jesus  College,  1660  ; 
Margaret  Professor,  1661 ;  Mas- 
ter of  Trinity,  1G62;  Bishop  of 
Chester,  1671  :  died,  July  16, 
1686. 


JOHX   PEARS 3N.  219 

monurnent  in  Lis  cathedral:  but  his  greatest  and 
most  lasting  memorial  is  to  be  found  in  his  works. 
Let  us  then  consider  him  as  a  theologian  and 
critic. 

We  mean  in  common  speech  by  theology  the 
science  which,  accepting  certain  truths  as  of  irrefra- 
gable authority,  builds  upon  them  methodically,  by 
logical  inference,  a  system  of  teaching  which  covers 
all  the  chief  points  in  the  region  of  spiritual  things. 
Theology  of  some  kind  there  must  be ;  as  soon  as  a 
teacher  passes  beyond  the  bare  words  of  Scripture ; 
as  soon  as  he  attempts  to  combine  and  harmonise 
the  statements  of  different  passages ;  as  soon  as  he 
admits  the  authority  of  logical  deductions  from 
revealed  truth— he  theologises.  Christian  theology 
was  at  first  occasional  and  unsystematic,  as  we  find 
it  in  the  works  of  the  ancient  Fathers ;  but  in  the 
Middle  Ages,  it  passed  from  the  Church  to  the  School, 
from  the  comparatively  popular  and  informal  dis- 
course of  the  preacher  to  the  eager  but  limited 
disputation  of  the  university,  and  the  formal  "  read- 
ing" of  the  professor's  chair.  And  during  this 
period  there  grew  up  a  great  body  of  systematic 
theology,  distinguished  on  the  one  hand  by  the 
sharpest  limitation,  on  the  other  by  the  greatest 
speculative  freedom.  This  theology  was  founded  on 
certain  propositions  which  were  held  to  admit  of 
no  dispute ;  texts  of  Scripture,  decrees  of  Councils, 
opinions  of  Fathers,  supplied  the  "  sentences  "  which 


220  MASTERS   I>T   ENGLISH    THEOLOGY: 

were  accepted  on  all  hands  as  absolute  truth.  But 
an  infinite  ingenuity  was  bestowed  on  drawing 
inferences  from  these  acknowledged  propositions 
by  the  rules  of  the  logic  universally  recognised, 
so  as  to  cover  an  ever  wider  field ;  for  theology 
in  those  days  drew  into  itself  what  we  now  dis- 
tinguisli  as  Ethics  and  Metaphysics,  and  attempted 
to  solve  every  problem  which  arose  out  of  the 
nature  of  the  Deity,  or  from  the  relation  of  God 
to  man,  or  of  man  to  his  brother  man.  Every 
such  problem  was  thought  to  be  soluble  by  the  due 
application  of  some  recognised  principle  received 
from  authority,  and  the  constant  decision  of  new 
problems  by  accredited  doctors  tended  constantly 
to  increase  the  number  of  such  admitted  princi- 
ples, much  as  the  range  of  the  common  law  is  con- 
stantly extended  by  the  decisions  of  the  judges. 
It  is  scarcely  necessary  to  say,  that  a  large  portion 
of  these  disputations  and  decisions  related  to  those 
points  on  which  we  have  least  knowledge  from 
revelation  ;  those  propositions  which  were  most  open 
were  of  course  most  frequently  mooted.  Up  to  the 
end  of  the  fifteenth  century  the  same  authorities  and 
the  same  method  were  recognised  in  every  school  in 
Europe,  or  were  only  questioned  here  and  there 
by  independent  thinkers  like  Wiclif,  who  were  too 
much  in  advance  of  their  time  to  produce  a  per- 
manent effect. 

But  with  the  revived  study  of  the  ancient  classical 


JOHN   PEAKSON.  221 

literature  in  the  fifteenth  century  there  came  a  vast 
change  over  the  mind  of  Europe.  Men  awoke  to 
the  consciousness  that  there  was  a  world  of  thought 
and  feeling  altogether  outside  the  limits  of  scholastic 
philosophy;  that  there  was  a  natural  grace  and 
charm  in  writers  who  were  wholly  uninfluenced 
by  the  acute  systematising  of  the  Middle  Ages ; 
that  there  was  even  much  wisdom  to  be  found  in  the 
works  of  men  who  were  simply  seekers  after  truth 
with  no  infallible  method  to  guide  them.  The 
critical  spirit  arose  ;  men  came  to  see  that  every 
sentence  handed  down  from  antiquity,  every  judg- 
ment of  an  irrefragable  doctor,  was  not  worthy  of 
equal  veneration  ;  and  further,  that  some  documents 
which  passed  under  the  shadow  of  great  names  had 
in  fact  no  claim  to  such  authority  at  all.  The 
absolute  accuracy  and  sufficiency  of  the  Vulgate 
version  of  the  Scriptures  were  brought  into  question  ; 
the  study  of  the  Greek  and  Hebrew  was  recom- 
mended; the  earnest  and  unsystematic  teaching  of 
a  Chrysostom  was  preferred  to  that  of  the  mediaeval 
doctors ;  the  study  of  secular  literature  was  recom- 
mended as  a  preparation  for  that  of  theology ;  the 
scholastic  method  was  thought  by  many  to  minister 
to  over-subtlety  and  vain  jangling  rather  than  to 
edification ;  the  great  edifice  of  scholastic  theology 
w^as  to  many  a  Tower  of  Babel  which  would  never 
reach  to  heaven.  This  tendency  to  philology,  to 
criticism,   and   to   the   rejection   of    the   scholastic 


222      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

method  in  favour  of  one  more  simple  and  natural, 
appears  very  strongly  in  Erasmus  ;  *  and  the  philo- 
sophic rebellion  against  the  mere  dead-weight  of 
authority  and  scholasticism  was  immensely  promoted 
in  the  succeeding  century  by  the  influence  of  Bacon 
and  Descartes.t  But  many  theologians  even  among 
the  Eeformers  adhered  still  to  the  old  method ;  and 
no  one  among  the  Anglican  divines  of  the  seven- 
teenth century,  I  think,  defines  his  position  in  this 
respect  more  clearly  and  explicitly  than  John  Pear- 
son. If  I  were  to  give  him  a  distiiictive  name,  like 
those  which  in  the  Middle  Ages  marked  this  as  the 
Subtle,  that  as  the  Irrefragable  Doctor,  I  should 
be  disposed  to  call  him  the  Scholar  Doctor.  In  his 
theological  method  he  is  a  schoolman;  in  his  scholar- 
ship he  belongs  to  the  Renaissance. 

There  is  perhaps  no  more  clear  index  of  Pearson's 
position  with  regard  to  the  standard  of  Christian 


*  See  particularly  his  '  Ratio  I  ber  of  the   Company,  Petavius, 


seu  Methodus  coiupendio  per- 
veniendi  ad  veram  Theologiam' 
('  0pp.'  V.  75  ff.  ed.  Leyden, 
1703),  a  tract  whicli  J.  S.  Semler 
tliought  worth  reprinting  in  the 
last  centurv. 


speaks  ('  De  Theol.  Dogm.,' 
Prol.  i.  1)  with  a  certain  con- 
tempt of  that  "  theologia  conten- 
tiosa  ac  subtilis  qua  ah'quot 
abhinc  orta  seculis  jam  scholas 
occupavit,"  and  proposes  to  draw 


t  It  is  perhaps  worth  notice  ;  "  elegantiorem  et  uberiorem  al- 
that  the  Jesuits,  with  their  cha-  ;  teram"  from  the  genuine  study 
racteristic  readiness  to  adapt  ;  of  antiquity.  Compare  viii.  4 : 
themselves     to     circumstances,     "  Scholasticas  istas  lites  alienas 


early     rejected     the     scholastic     a    proposito    nostro    nee    valde 
method.    A  distinguished  mem-  !  necessarias  omittam." 


JOHN   PEARSON.  223 

doctrine  and  practice  than  is  to  be  found  in  a  Concio 
ad  Clerum  preached  at  Cambridge  soon  after  the 
Eestoration.*  His  advice  to  students  of  theology  is 
— *'Have  done  with  the  morbid  restlessness  of  the 
present  day ;  shun  all  attempts  at  novelty  ;  enquire 
what  was  from  the  beginning,  consult  the  sources, 
liave  recourse  to  antiquity,  go  back  to  the  Fathers, 
look  to  the  Primitive  Church."  Here,  he  thinks, 
are  to  be  found  the  arms  with  which  papal  and 
puritan  errors  are  alike  to  be  put  down.  In  the  vast 
forest  of  Scripture  all  forms  of  errors  may  find 
lurking-placeSjt  and  of  ingenious  arguments  there 
is  no  end ;  let  the  orthodox  be  as  diligent  as  they 
may,  they  will  find  it  hard  to  outdo  their  opponents. 
The  one  authority  by  which  all  can  be  alike  crushed 
is  that  of  the  ancient  Church.  We  must  learn  the 
truth,  as  Irenseus  says,  in  those  churches  which 
derive  their  tradition  from 'the  apostles.  As  to  tliat 
detestable  invention  of  Calvin's,  which  for  a  time 
superseded  all  the  most  sacred  traditions  of  our 
ancient  Church — unroll  the  ecclesiastical  annals, 
read  the  works  of  the  most  ancient  Fathers ;  you 
will  find  ejtiscopacy  everywhere,  presbytery  nowhere. 
Are  the  Komanists  scandalised  that  in  our  public 
prayers  we  invoke  neither  saint  nor  angel  ?  Let  us 
take  the  Apostolic  Churches  as  the  interpreters  of 
tlie  Apostolic  letters,  and  we  have  a  complete  and 


Opera  Minora,''  Ed.  Cliurton,  ii.  6.  f  Ibid.  ii.  10. 


224  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

ready  vindication.  Do  the  modem  innovators  object 
to  many  things  in  our  form  of  Common  Prayer  ? 
They  are  exactly  the  portions  which  have  the  fullest 
consent  of  antiquity.  From  whichever  side  it  may 
be  attacked,  the  surest  defence  of  the  Church 
of  Enghmd  is  its  agreement  with  the  Primitive 
Church. 

Pearson  deliberately  and  avowedly  adhered  to 
the  scholastic  method  in  theology.  He  announced, 
as  soon  as  he  took  his  place  in  a  professor's  chair,  "  It 
is  theology  that  I  profess,  and  that  the  scholastic."* 
And  then  he  further  defines  what  he  understands 
by  theology.  "  When  I  speak  of  theology,"  he  says, 
''  I  mean  the  science  which  is  concerned  with  God 
and  things  divine  ;  and  when  I  apply  that  term  to 
it  as  one  apart  and  separate  from  other  sciences, 
I  take  for  its  subject-matter  the  revelation  made 
by  God,  and  the  truths'  through  that  revelation  to 
us  made  known ;  further,  as  the  latest  and  fullest 
manifestation  of  the  will  of  God  is  that  made  by 
Christ,  I  understand  by  theology — to  limit  the 
term  still  further — the  doctrine  of  the  Christian 
religion."  And  he  prefers  the  scholastic  method 
of  stating  and  dealing  with  things  divine  so 
revealed  to  us  by  God  through  His  Son.  For 
as  the  revelation  of  God  contains  teaching  varied 
and  multiform,  the  Church  was  made    aware    that 


*  '  Opera  Minora,'  Ed.  Churton,  i.  ] . 


JOHN  PEAESON.  225 

this  scholastic  theology  was,  if  not  absolutely 
necessary,  at  least  of  very  great  utility.  It  is  well 
that  the  varied  truths  of  revelation  should  be 
treated  in  some  kind  of  order  and  method,  and 
the  clearer  the  method,  the  more  readily  are  errors 
and  fallacies  detected.  "  This,  then,  is  the  task  of 
the  scholastic  theology;  to  set  forth  clearly  and 
succinctly  the  Christian  doctrine  which  is  according 
to  the  faith ;  to  state  it  with  fit  arrangement  and 
precise  method  from  theological  sources ;  to  inves- 
tigate, prove,  confirm,  defend  it  by  means  of  right 
reason,  well  informed  by  the  ordinary  human  arts 
and  sciences."  That  he  had  a  sincere  and  very 
natural  admiration  for  the  order,  method  and  in- 
genuity of  the  great  schoolmen  is  evident ;  but  he 
was  not  blind  to  some  at  least  of  their  faults.  He 
begs  his  hearers  not  to  fancy  that  he  is  intending 
to  take  them  back  from  the  purity  of  the  Eenais- 
sance*to  the  barbarisms  of  the  Middle  Ages.  No 
such  thing ;  the  schoolmen  had  their  defects,  of 
which  the  first  is,  that  they  did  not  know  how  to 
criticise  authorities.  They  take  propositions  from 
Scripture;  but  they  make  no  distinction  between 
Canonical  and  Apocryphal  books,  and  they  use  the 
Vulgate  as  if  it  were  the  original  text.  They  quote 
Councils,  but  they  make  no  distinction  between 
ancient  and  modern,  bet^veen  the  greatest  and  the 


*  "  A  puritate  renascentium  literarum"  ('  0pp.  Blin.'  i.  3). 
[king's  coll.]  q 


226      MASTEES  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

most  contemptible  assemblies.  They  allege  the 
consent  of  the  Fathers ;  but  they  quote  spurious 
as  well  as  genuine  works,  many  works  known  to 
us  they  never  saw,  and  of  Greek  books  they  knew 
only  Latin  translations.  They  rely  upon  decrees  of 
Popes ;  but  while  no  Pope  is  more  than  a  respect- 
able patristic  authority,  some  Popes  are  much 
less.  AVe  Anglicans,  on  the  other  hand,  set  in  the 
highest  place  of  authority  the  Canonical  books  of 
Scripture,  speaking  their  own  tongues  wherein 
they  were  written ;  we  receive  Councils,  chiefly 
General  Councils,  which  really  speak  the  mind  of 
the  ancient  Church ;  we  think  much  of  the  consent 
of  the  Fathers,  but  then  by  "  Fathers  "  we  mean 
ancient  writers  of  admitted  weight,  to  the  exclusion 
of  all  spurious  or  apocryphal  writings ;  as  to  the 
Popes,  we  recognise  the  best  of  them  in  any  case 
simply  as  Fathers.  With  these  allowances,  Pearson 
proceeds  to  adopt  as  the  basis  of  his  theology  the 
greatest  of  mediaeval  systems,  the  '  Summa  Theo- 
logiae'  of  Thomas  Aquinas.  Pearson  is,  in  short,  a 
schoolman,  with  the  scholarship  of  the  Keuaissance. 
Of  the  Eeformed  Churches  he  speaks  with  the 
utmost  respect ;  yet  he  feels  that  if  the  Eoman 
Church  has  erred  by  an  undiscriminating  acceptance 
of  authority,  the  Reformed  Churches  have  no  less 
erred  by  an  undiscriminatiug  rejection.*     They  have 


0pp.  Min.,'  i.  431. 


JOHN  PEARSON.  227 

abandoned  idolatry,  embraced  Christian  doctrine  in 
its  purity,  rejected  traditions  of  men,  sliaken  off 
the  grievous  burden  of  ceremonies,  extirpated  papal 
tyranny,  corrected  everything  according  to  the 
exact  standard  of  the  Word  of  God.  Still,  we  must 
admit  that  their  intentions  were  better  than  the 
results  which  they  attained ;  the  reaction  from 
the  old  state  of  things  was  too  violent.  Hence,  in 
extirpating  idolatry  they  hardly  retained  reverence ; 
in  rejecting  the  traditions  of  men  they  hardly 
spared  those  of  the  apostles ;  in  ridding  themselves 
of  ceremonies  they  stripped  the  Church  almost 
bare;  and  in  rejecting  human  authority  in  matters 
of  faith  they  preferred  their  own  opinions  to  the 
undisputed  dogmas  of  Fathers  and  decrees  of 
Councils.  And  the  revolutionary  spirit  was  suc- 
ceeded by  an  unreasoning  conservatism  ;  institutions 
lirst  set  up  as  temporary  expedients  in  a  time  of 
war  and  tumult  they  now  refuse  to  amend ;  they 
fear  lest  the  whole  edifice  should  fall  if  a  stone  is 
touched.  Happier  far  was  the  Anglican  Eeforma- 
tion,  which  retained  the  ancient  episcopal  order, 
and  acknowledged  the  authority  of  Creeds  and 
Fathers,  as  well  as  that  of  Scripture. 

With  Pearson's  views  on  theology,  he  was,  as  we 
might  anticipate,  no  Cartesian.  The  champion  of 
authoi'ity  and  precedent  had  no  sympatliy  with  the 
ardent  and  self-reliant  spirit  who  was  ready  to 
destroy  the  existing  fabric  of  thought  and  build  it 

Q  2 


228      MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 

Up  again  by  liis  own  unaided  skill.*  His  God  is 
the  God  of  Kevelation,  and  has  nothing  in  common 
witli  the  metaphysical  deity  of  Descartes.f  That 
gentleman  may,  he  admits,  be  an  ingenious  philo- 
sopher, but  in  theology  he  can  by  no  means  be 
permitted  to  make  a  clean  sweep  of  all  that  has 
gone  before,  and  start  afresh  from  the  mere  fact 
of  consciousness.  With  Pearson,  discussion  has  its 
limits  as  well  as  its  laws ;  the  questioning  and 
the  cavilling  of  the  age  in  which  lie  found  himself 
was  evidently  in  the  highest  degree  distasteful  to 
him.  A  man  cannot  propound  the  question,  he 
complains,!  whether  God  is  omnipresent,  but  up 
starts  one  who  objects,  that  it  is  not  yet  agreed 
that  there  is  a  God.  If  we  set  up  the  thesis,  that 
obedience  is  due  to  a  king,  men  must  first  assure 
themselves  that  there  ought  to  be  a  king ;  nay, 
whether  a  Christian  can  be  a  king.  The  age  is 
in  truth  infected,  he  hints,  with  Cartesianism  run 
mad.  And  this  disposition  to  reject  all  authority, 
as  such,  and  start  in  quest  of  truth  without 
assumptions,  is  perhaps  at  least  as  common  in 
the  nineteeenth  as  it  was  in  the  seventeenth 
century. 

With  his  firm  and  fixed  principles  he  has  no 
more  hesitation  in  giving  a  decision  on  a  point  of 
theology  than  Lord  Coke  had  in  deciding  a  point 


*  '  0pp.  Min.'  i.  272.  f  Ibid.  i.  28.  J  Ibid.  i.  271  f. 


JOHN  PEARSON.  229 

of  common  law.  He  "  speaks  resolvedly  as  a  divine, 
to  whom  it  properly  appertains  to  speak  of  theo- 
logical doctrines."  *  His  authorities  are  definite, 
and  he  has  perfect  confidence  in  his  methods.  He 
quite  naturally  ends  a  dissertation  with  the  con- 
clusive words,  oTTEp  eSei  Set^at,  Quod  erat  deinon- 
strandum ;  the  proposition  is  proved,  and  there  is 
an  end.f  A  greater  contrast  to  the  questioning 
and  hesitating  tone  of  much  of  our  modern  theology 
could  scarcely  be  imagined.  But  Pearson  had 
also,  what  many  very  confident  disputants  have  not, 
the  tolerance  which  arises  from  a  consciousness 
of  strength.  His  calmness  and  candour  were  as 
conspicuous  as  his  logic  and  learning  in  the 
Savoy  Conference,  where  he  won  the  admiration  of 
foemen  who  were  able  to  estimate  his  worth. 
•'•  Dr.  Pearson,"  says  Kichard  Baxter,  "  was  their 
true  logician  and  disputant.  He  disputed  accurately, 
soberly,  and  calmly,  being  but  once  in  any  passion, 
breeding  in  us  a  great  respect  for  him,  and  a  per- 
suasion that  if  he  had  been  independent  he  would 
have  been  for  peace,  and  that  if  all  were  in  his  power 
it  would  have  gone  well.  He  was  the  strength  and 
honour  of  that  cause  which  we  doubted  whether 
he  heartily  maintained."  The  last  sentence  shows 
that  the  Nonconformists  failed  to  understand  a 
man  who  could  be  at  once  calm  and  earnest.     That 


0pp.  Min.'  ii.  1G8.  f  Ibid.  ii.  1G2. 


230      MASTEES  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

Pearson  loved  peace  is  true  enougli,  and  he  would 
doubtless  have  conceded  more  than  some  of  his 
colleagues ;  but  the  whole  tenor  of  his  life  shows 
that  he  would  not  have  bought  peace  by  the  sacri- 
fice of  one  jot  of  that  which  he  regarded  as  essential 
to  the  doctrine  or  discipline  of  the  Church.  That  he 
w^ould  not  have  given  up  episcopac)^  is  certain,  and 
I  much  doubt  whether  he  would  have  accepted 
such  a  compromise  as  Ussher's  *•  moderate  episco- 
pacv."  The  absence  of  passion  made  him,  as 
Burnet  says,  ''more  instructive  than  affective"  as 
a  preacher,  but  it  was  a  most  valuable  quality  for  a 
disputant  and  controversialist. 

His  preference  for  the  scholastic  method  in 
theology  appears  in  his  famous  '  Exposition  of  the 
Creed.'  That  book  is  indeed  on  the  surface  some- 
what more  popular  than  the  formal  treatises  of  the 
schoolmen,  as  one  founded  on  parish  lectures  could 
scarcely  fail  to  be ;  but  it  is  evidently  the  work 
of  one  accustomed  to  rigorous  definition  and  exact 
deduction,  and  might  easily  be  thrown  into  a  form 
similar  to  that  in  which  Thomas  Aquinas  and  other 
great  schoolmen  have  treated  the  same  subjects. 
The  style  is  singularly  unambitious  ;  it  seems  to  aim 
at  nothing  beyond  the  careful  and  accurate  state- 
ment of  propositions  and  arguments.  The  truth  is, 
it  is  the  style  of  a  scientific  treatise,  and  not  of  an 
oration  or  declamation.  Nothing  is  further  from 
Pearson's  thought  than  to  recommend  the  truths  of 


JOHN  PEARSON.  231 

Christianity   by    the   arts   of  rhetoric  ;    an    ornate 
treatise    on    geometry  would   probably   have    been 
quite  as  much  to  his  taste  as  an  ornate  treatise  on 
the  Creed.     He  regards  the  propositions  which  he 
takes  for  the  foundation  of  his  reasoning?  as  beins: 
just  as  irrefragable,  and  almost  as  precise,  as  those  of 
Euclid.     The  propositions  which  he  takes  for  granted 
are  those  which,   he   is  sure,  no  good  man  would 
deny ;  and  he  probably  regarded  those  who  did  deny 
tliem  much  in  the  same  way  tliat  the  men  of  real 
science  in  our  time  look  upon  the  ingenious  persons 
who  pester  them  with  proofs  that  Copernicus  and 
Newton  were  altogether  mistaken.     And   this  dry 
scientific  way  of  treating  theology  explains  the  de- 
fect,  which    has  been   often  noted,   in   his   concep- 
tion of  Faith;    such  a  conception  of  Faith  as  that 
set  forth   (for   instance)  in  Julius  Hare's  *  Victory 
of  Faith '   is  beside   his   purpose ;    for  the   present 
he  is   not   concerned   with   faith   as   a   power,    but 
only  with  the  assent  of  tlie  intellect  to  truths  re- 
vealed.    For  his  purpose,  to  introduce  the  concep- 
tion of  faith  which  is  most  familiar  to  the  practical 
teacher    would    be    superfluous    and   inconvenient. 
As    it    stands,    his    discussion    corresponds   to   his 
definition. 

The  notes  to  the  '  Exposition '  are  at  least  as  re- 
markable as  the  text.  He  explains  in  his  address 
to  the  reader  that  the  text  "  containeth  fully  what 
can  be  delivered  and  made  intellio^ible  in  the  Enji;- 


232      MASTEES  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY: 

lish  tongue  "  for  tlie  use  of  the  unlearned  ;  while  he 
has  ''  placed  in  the  margin  .  .  .  whatever  is  neces- 
sary for  the  illustration  of  any  part  of  the  Creed  " 
for  the  benefit  of  scholars;  the  result  is  a  work 
exactly  in  the  form  of  a  modern  *  Handbook/  in 
which  a  simple  text  is  supplemented  by  learned  notes. 
And  the  notes  are  admirable  of  their  kind.  The 
works  of  most  of  the  great  writers  of  the  seventeenth 
century  are  more  remarkable  for  the  number  and 
variety  than  for  the  appositeness  of  their  citations : 
Pearson's  are  choice  and  apposite ;  they  are  almost 
always  the  best  for  their  purpose  and  almost  always 
fairly  interpreted  ;  he  will  cite  j^schylus  for  a  point 
of  scholarship  and  Augustine  for  a  point  of  doctrine ; 
and,  both  in  one  case  and  the  other,  he  will  take 
infinite  pains  to  illustrate  a  subordinate  point  of 
interpretation  with  curious  learning.  The  more  we 
study  his  work,  the  more  we  are  led  to  admire  the 
extent  of  his  reading,  the  accuracy  of  his  scholarship, 
and  the  soundness  of  his  judgment. 

Pearson  had  a  great  veneration  for  the  primitive 
and  catholic  institution  of  episcopacy,  which  he  had 
seen  with  pain  and  grief  abolished  for  a  time  in 
his  native  land.  Part  of  his  quarrel  with  the  Pope 
was  that  he  had  absorbed  many  functions  which 
properly  belonged  to  the  episcopate  generally.*    And 


*  "  Exsors  unius  pontificis 
potestas  reliquorum  omnium 
antistitum  jus  eripuit,  absorpsit " 


('  0pp.  Min./  i.  434 ;  compare 
274,  286).  What  would  he  say 
if  he  were  livinor  now  ? 


JOHN   PEARSON.  233 

it  was  probably  this  love  for  episcopacy  which  led 
him  to  join  in  the  Ignatian  controversy.  The 
genuineness  of  the  collection  of  letters  attributed 
to  Ignatius  of  Antioch  was  very  keenly  discussed, 
for  it  was  felt  that  if  they  were  the  genuine  work 
of  one  who  suffered  martyrdom  at  an  advanced 
age  in  the  year  115,  episcopacy  must  have  been 
a  venerated  institution  of  the  Church  in  the  age 
immediately  succeeding  that  of  the  apostles;  the 
letters  everywhere  recognise  it,  and  recognise  it  as 
an  institution  essential  to  the  completeness  of  a 
church.  After  the  publications  of  TJssher  (16i4) 
and  Yossius  (1646),  it  was  generally  admitted  that 
only  seven,  out  of  the  larger  number  which  bore 
the  name  of  Ignatius,  were  genuine ;  but  even  these 
were  assigned  by  the  veteran  Daille  to  a  date  not 
much  before  the  reign  of  Constantino.  It  was  with 
Daille  that  Pearson  joined  issue  in  the  *  Vindiciae 
Ignatiante.'  On  the  main  point  victory  was  easy ; 
the  date  assigned  by  Daille  is  destitute  of  all  pro- 
bability, and  Pearson  had  no  difficulty  in  refuting 
his  arguments ;  whether  he  proved  the  seven  epistles 
to  be  the  work  of  the  martyred  bishop  of  Antioch 
admits  of  more  doubt ;  *  but  the  work  has  a  value 


*  The  whole  aspect  of  the  I  now  regarded  by  many  as  the 
question  has  been  materially  j  only  genuine  portion  (Curelon, 
changed  iu  recent  times  by  the  j  '  Corpus  Ignatian um').  K,  A. 
discovery  (1836)  in  the  Nitrian  j  Lipsius  ('  Die  Aechtheit  d. 
desert  of  a  Syriac  translation  [  Syrisch.  Kecension  der  Ignatian. 
of   three    epistles,    which    are    Briefe,'  in  Illgen's  '  Zeitschrift 


234 


MASTERS  m   ENGLISH  THEOLOGY  : 


independent  of  its  professed  end ;  it  is  full  of  ad- 
mirable discussions  of  collateral  points  which  the 
author  found  it  necessary  to  establish  in  the  course 
of  his  argument.  Probably  even  to  this  day  there 
is  no  more  complete  statement  of  the  evidences  for 
primitive  episcopacy  than  is  to  be  found  in  the 
*  Yindiciae.'  When  the  question  turns  up  incident- 
ally of  the  genuineness  of  a  treatise  of  Origen,  he 
investigates  the  matter  with  the  most  exhaustive 
care.  Similarly  he  discusses  the  age  of  the  Pseudo- 
Dionysius.  The  obscure  point  of  the  date  of  Yalen- 
tinus  the  heresiarch  is  made  the  subject  of  most 
patient  research.  And  in  these  investigations,  and 
in  other  incidental  discussions,  he  shows  the  true 
scholar's  instinct :  he  always  recurs  to  original  au- 
thorities, he  is  careful  and  exact  in  his  interpreta- 
tions, and  he  illustrates  the  passage  in  question  by 
similar  usages  elsewhere.  If  proof  were  wanting  of 
the  care  and  scholarlike  skill  with  which  Pearson 
read  his  books,  it  would  be  supplied  by  the  '  Margi- 
nalia ' — the  notes  and  jottings  from  the  margins 
of  his  books— which  have  been  published  in  recent 
times. 

The  works  by  which  Pearson  is   chiefly   known 


fiir  hist.  TheoL'  1856,  I.),  ad- 
mitting the  genuineness  of  the 
Syriac,  holds  the  Greek  version 
of  the  seven  epistles  to  be  a 
work  of  the  middle  of  the  second 
century;  but  many  distinguished 


scholars  (as,  for  instance,  Bishops 
Christopher  Wordsworth  and 
Hefele)  still  maintain,  as  Pear- 
son did,  the  seven  Greek  epistles 
to  be  the  genuine  work  of  Igna- 
tius. 


JOHN   PEARSON.  235 

are  tlie  '  Exposition  of  the  Creed,'  and  tlie  '  Yin- 
dicios  Ignatiance ; '  on  these  his  reputation  might 
safely  rest.  But  the  complete  list  of  his  writings 
shows  great  literary  activity,  extending,  if  not 
literally  to  the  end  of  his  days,  to  the  end  of 
his  intellectual  life ;  for  his  mind  fell  into  ruin 
before  his  bodily  powers  utterly  failed.  From 
the  days  when,  a  young  man,  he  published  the 
"  Sermon  preached  before  the  University  of  Cam- 
bridge," to  the  days  when  his  failing  hand  left 
unfinished  the  *  Dissertations  on  the  early  Popes  of 
Rome,'  he  seems  never  to  have  been  idle ;  sermons, 
lectures,  letters,  and  prefaces  indicate  his  activity  in 
the  intervals  of  more  solid  work ;  and  evervthins: 
that  he  published  contains  something  solid  and 
weighty.* 


*  The  following  list  of  Bishop  i  Sermon  on  the  death  of  George 
Pearson's  writings  is  taken  from    Lord  Berkeley.     London,  1658. 
Archdeacon  Cliurton's  edition  of        7.  Preface  to  Stokes's  Expli- 
the  '  Minor  Works,'  p.  cxxxv. : —    cation  of  the  Minor  Prophets. 

1.  A  Sermon  preached  before  ,  London,  1659. 

the  University  of  Cambridge,  at  ,      8.  Preface  toHalcs's  Eemains. 

St.  Mary's,  on  St.  Luke  xi.  2.  '  London,  1659. 

A.D.  1643.  I      9.  Exposition  of  the  Apostles' 

2.  Christ's  Birth  not  mistimed.  ■  Creed.     London,  1659. 
London,  1649.  !      10.  No  Necessity  of  Eeforma- 

3.  Preface  to  Lord  Falkland's    tion  of  the  Public  Doctrine  of 
Discourse.     London,  1651.  I  the  Church  of  England.   London, 

4.  Prolegomena  in  Ilieroclem.  !  1660. 

London,  1655.  11.  Answer    to    Dr.    Burges. 

5.  Papers    in    '  Scljism    Un-    London,  1660. 

masked,'     Paris,  165S.  t      12.  Praefatio  ad  Criticos   Sa- 

6.  Tiie   Patriarchal    Funeral.  !  cros.    London,  1660. 

[13. 


236 


MASTEKS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 


Bishop  Pearson  has  not  the  great  renown  which 
waits  on  genius  and  eloquence;  his  works  have 
never  been^  and  never  can  be,  popular;  but  no 
English  scholar  and  theologian  is  more  perfect  in 
his  kind.  He  knew  his  powers,  and  undertook  no- 
thing that  he  could  not  perfectly  carry  out.  Pro- 
bably no  other  Englishman,  few  of  any  nation,  had 
the  same   accurate  knowledge  of  antiquity  which 


13.  Dedicatio  et  Pr?efatio  ad 
Diogenem  Laertium  Menagii. 
London,  1664. 

14.  Prsefatio  Parsenetica  ad 
Vetus  Tesfamentum.  Cautabr,, 
1665. 

15.  Oratio  ad  Exsequias 
Mattlieei  Wrenn,  Episc.  Eliensis. 
1667. 

16.  Letter  against  promiscuous 
Ordinations.     London,  1668, 

17.  Lectiones  de  Deo  et  Attri- 
butis.  1661  sqq.  [In  'Opera 
Minora,'  ed.  Churton,  vol.  i.] 

18.  Orationes  in  Comitiis  Can- 
tabr.  1661-1671.  ['0pp.  Min.,' 
i.  397  ff.] 

19.  Conciones  ad  Clerum, 
1661-167L  ['0pp.  Min.,'  ii. 
Iff.] 

20.  Determinationes  Theolo- 
gies Sex.   ['0pp.  Min.,' i.  269  ff.] 

21.  Vindicise  Epistolarum  S. 
Ignatii.     Cantab.,  1672. 

22.  Sermon  preat-bed  at  West- 
minster Abbey,  Nov.  5,  1673. 
London,  1673. 

23.  Anuales  Cyprianici.  Oxon, 
1682. 


O     CS    CO 
.^      S    GO 

r—i^fi, — I 
1^      % 


2   3  Q 
Ph  O  ^ 


I      24.  Annales  Pau-  N^ 
j  lini. 

25.  Lectiones    in 
I  Acta  Apost. 
I      26.  Dissertationes 

de  Serie  et   succes- 

sione  Piimorum  Eo- 

mae  Episcoporum.       J 

27.  Various  Letters,  Frag- 
ments, &c.,  collected  by  Arch- 
deacon Churton. 

28.  Notes  on  Hesychius.  MSS. 
Trin.  Coll.,  Cantabr. 

29.  Notes  on  Ignatius,  in 
Smith's  edition  of  Ignatius. 
Oxon,  1709. 

30.  Notes  on  Justin,  in  Thirl- 
by's  edition  of  Justin.  London, 
1722. 

31.  Notes  on  JEschylus.  MS. 
Bodl.  Eawl.  193. 

To  tliese  should  be  added  the 
•Marginalia'  from  certain  of 
Pearson's  books  preserved  in 
Trinity  College  Library,  pub- 
lished by  Mr.  Hort  in  the 
'Journal  of  Classical  and  Sa- 
cred Philology,'  vol.  i.  pp.  98  ff, 
I  399  ff. 


JOHN^   PEAESOX.  237 

Pearson  possessed,  and  the  same  power  of  using  it 
with  skill  and  judgment.  If  he  had  not  been  a 
theologian,  he  miglit  have  been  known  simply  as 
the  best  English  scholar  before  Bentley ;  he  was  a 
theologian,  but  he  was  none  the  less  a  great  scholar. 
And  there  is  a  singleness  and  consistency  in  Pearson's 
character  which  wins  an  admiration  not  always  given 
to  more  brilliant  parts.  In  times  of  great  trial  and 
difficulty  he  maintained  his  principles  with  a  stead- 
fast calmness  which  deserves  the  highest  praise ;  in 
adversity  he  was  not  cowardly,  in  prosperity  he  was 
not  arrogant ;  rarely  has  a  prominent  man  so  kept 
the  even  tenor  of  his  way  in  the  midst  of  storms 
such  as  those  of  the  seventeenth  century. 

Pearson  occupies  a  place  apart  among  English 
theologians.  Xo  one,  probably,  of  the  whole  band 
has  less  claim  to  originality  or  imagination  ;  he  pro- 
ceeds always  upon  authorities,  and  his  distinctive 
skill  is  in  the  discrimination  and  use  of  authorities. 
He  was  altogether  incapable  of  the  Platonic  sweep  of 
thought  which  led  Hooker  from  Puritanic  contro- 
versy to  his  noble  contemplation  of  the  laws  which 
govern  the  universe.  He  is  equally  removed  from 
the  poetic  fancy  of  Jeremy  Taylor  and  the  brilliant 
invective  of  South.  Perhaps  among  English  divines 
the  one  who  most  resembles  him  is  Bull ;  but  Bull 
is  inferior  to  him  both  in  scholarship  and  in  the  nice 
use  of  authorities ;  his  '  Defence  of  the  Ante-Nicene 
Faith'  —  doubtless  an   admirable  work  —  has  never 


238  MASTERS   IN   ENGLISH   THEOLOGY  : 

taken  its  place  beside  Pearson's  *  Exposition  of  the 
Creed.'  The  theologian  ^vhom  we  may  best  compare 
and  contrast  with  Pearsoa  is  his  successor  in  the 
Mastership  of  Trinity  College,  Isaac  Barrow.  He 
too,  expounded  the  Creed,  but  in  how  different  a 
spirit !  With  Barrow,  even  when  he  treats  what 
would  be  to  many  bare  scientific  propositions,  the 
ethical  interest  is  dominant.  Contrast  Pearson's 
definition  of  faith  or  belief  as  "an  assent  to  that 
which  is  credible,  as  credible" — good  as  it  is  for 
his  own  purpose — with  Barrow's  contention  that 
"  infidelity  is  a  sinful  distemper  of  heart,"  and 
his  eloquent  picture  of  the  "many  gallant  feats 
that  have  been  achieved  by  faith,"  and  its  "ex- 
ploits of  spiritual  prowess ;  "  of  the  "  heroical  acts 
of  fortitude  and  patience "  which  "  the  bright  sun- 
shine of  grace  and  glory  upon  the  minds  of  our 
apostles  and  primitive  saints  did  produce,"  when 
"  a  little  troop  of  them  marched  out  with  resolu- 
tion to  attack  all  the  powers  of  hell  and  to  beat 
down  the  kingdom  of  darkness ;  to  despatch  all 
the  prejudices  and  errors  of  mankind,  and  to  subdue 
the  world  to  the  obedience  of  Christ."  Or  compare 
Pearson's  dry,  though  clear  and  sound,  defence  of 
the  Divinity  of  Christ,  with  the  dignified  eloquence 
in  which  Barrow  sets  forth  the  "  excellency  of  tlie 
Christian  Keligion,"  and  proves  that  Jesus  is  the 
true  Messias,  the  Son  of  God,  and  our  Lord.  In 
those  parts  of  the  subject  where  Barrow  goes  over 


JOHN   PEARSON.  239 

the  same  ground  as  Pearson,  he  is  less  succinct  and 
accurate,  less  scholarlike  than  Pearson ;  but  he 
evidently  feels  much  more  strongly  than  Pearson 
the  impulse  to  contemplate  the  great  truths  of 
religion  in  their  bearing  upon  actual  human  life ; 
he  is,  perhaps,  hardly  less  a  theologian  than 
Pearson,  but  he  is  much  more  a  preacher.  There 
is  need  of  both  in  the  great  House  of  God.  The 
theologian  without  the  preacher  dwells  apart,  and 
the  rays  of  his  light  fall  upon  few  hearts ;  the 
preacher  without  the  theologian  is  too  apt  to  sub- 
stitute popular  declamation  for  the  careful  teaching 
of  the  truth.  Pearson  was  not,  so  far  as  we  know, 
a  great  preacher;  but  probably  few  writers  have 
had  a  larger  influence  on  those  who  have  filled  the 
pulpits  of  the  Church  of  England  for  the  last  two 
centuries.  There  are  few  to  whom  that  Church 
is  more  indebted  for  the  grave  and  calm  tone, 
removed  equally  from  blind  submissiveness  on  the 
one  hand  and  restless  innovation  on  the  other, 
which  has  been  its  strength,  xind  never,  perhaps, 
was  the  exampjle  and  influence  of  a  man  like 
Pearson,  who,  in  days  of  infinite  disputation,  de- 
fended the  great  cardinal  truths  of  the  Christian 
faith,  regardless  of  the  perpetual  skirmishes  about 
him,  more  needed  than  it  is  at  the  present  time, 
when  the  hiohest  truths  seem  in  danijer  of  beins: 
thrust  into  the  background  by  matters  of  mere 
speculation  or  mere  ceremony.     The  more  we  have 


240  MASTERS  IN  ENGLISH  THEOLOGY. 

of  his  really  sound  learniDg,  of  his  clearness  and 
dispassionate  accuracy  in  debate,  the  more  conscious 
shall  we  become  of  the  infinite  importance  of  the 
Faith  once  for  all  delivered  to  the  saints,  and  of  the 
comparative  nothingness  of  many  of  the  objects  for 
which  men  less  learned  and  more  passionate  main- 
tain an  eager  struggle. 


THE   END. 


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